Isaac’s child sized felted oven mitts

I’m including a BUNCH of extra info here, to help others to customize their own mitts. I originally followed the Galway pattern, but only knit one mitt, see comparison photo. Knit per original Galway pattern and felted until the density of the fabric looked good, the pink mitt felted to only 8” tall, 5” wide at the palm, thumb is 2 3/8” long. My hands are 6 3/4” long x 3 1/4” at the palm. With my fingernails clipped short my fingertips firmly touch the inside top of the mitt, the thumb is too short, the palm is too wide, and the mitt is so short that it stops just past the crease of my wrist. I managed to burn my wrist the first time I used that mitt!

I revised the Galway Felted Mitt pattern to fit my grandson Isaac, who turns 10 on April 21, 2023. Isaac’s hands are 6” long from the crease of his wrist to the end of his longest finger, palms are 3” wide. With two strands held together of red Cascade 220 virgin wool, I cast on 40 stitches in the round, knit 1 row, purled 1 row, then knit 30 rows before the thumb join. (Those 30 rows included the wide black stripe. Sorry, but I didn’t keep track of how many rows were knit in the black wool.) After the thumb join I knit 27 rows, then knit the decreases. NOTE: I knit 1 extra row on the thumbs, then after felting I gave them a couple of good tugs to get them just the right length and made sure they stayed perfect as they dried. Before felting the mitts were 15” long x 6 3/8” at the palm, thumbs are 4” long from the inside curve where it joins the hand. I set the washer for a 14 minute wash cycle, hot/hot temp setting, lowest water level, and heavy duty fast/fast agitation. I felted longer than usual (30-35 minutes total), so they’d be a BIT smaller. I checked progress every 5 minutes, and each time I’d dial the machine back to 14 minutes so it never went through the rinse or spin cycles. When I was happy with the mitt size I thoroughly rinsed them by hand in lukewarm water. The mitts are 11” long and 4 1/4” wide at the palm. The thumbs are 3 inches long. The base of the thumbs where they’re joined onto the hand tightened up a little too much so while the mitts were still damp I forced the base of the thumbs onto the handles of my rolling pin and left them until the mitts were dry to make sure they don’t shrink up again. I like the thumb to be the slightest bit fitted, so the mitts don’t slide around when I’m using them. I think Isaac’s going to love them!

NOTE: I’ve knit felted mitts out of Cascade 220 virgin wool, Plymouth Galway worsted, Paton’s Classic Wool, and Lion Brand Fisherman’s Wool. The brands felted so similarly that, like saac’s red/black mitts, when I used Cascade 220 for mitts and stripes from Plymouth Galway, the transitions appeared seamless.