Madaket Mittens

Madaket Mittens by Heidi Todd Kozar. Blue Moon Fiber Arts Yaksi DK

Recently I had the pleasure to work with Blue Moon Fiber Arts Yaksi DK. You HAVE to get your hands on this yarn. It is soft and warm and so scrumptious. I designed these mittens to take advantage of all that goodness. Really they are crazy warm. I took them for a test drive on one of our extremely cold days last week and they kept my hands toasty warm. I realized I spent most of my walk rubbing the inside of my mitten because the yarn felt so lovely.

The second daughter is jonesing for these so they may have a new home soon.

A friend asked me recently about the names of my patterns. Madaket is the village on the western end of Nantucket Island where I grew up. My dad built us a cottage near the beach there when I was about 5 years old. Twenty eight years ago Rich and I took the original cottage off it's foundation with a crane (well, the contractor did the heavy lifting), built a new first floor with three bedrooms, two baths and a foyer, then we (they) lifted the original cottage back up on top of the first floor and it became our living room, dining room, kitchen and powder room. It is a tiny cottage still but much more in tune with our needs as a family. It was the center of our summers and still looms large in all our vacation plans. As a child I spent all my summer days wandering around Madaket on foot and on my bike and fortunately my girls had much the same experience. Afternoons were always spent at the beach. It was a glorious childhood and I wanted to celebrate my island with this design. Madaket can also be a brutal place in the winter, taking the brunt of terrible storms. So a warm pair of mittens are mandatory for any winter beach walks.

I hope you enjoy making these as much as you I know you will love wearing them.

(I did notice that BMFA is out of the Yaksi DK, but Tina promises it will be back soon.)