I showed you my Stargazer Mittens a few weeks ago. These are knit from Natalia Moreva’s Stargazer Mitten pattern, in Lichen & Lace 80/20 sock. Here they are again:

I decided to line these mittens with Rowan Kidsilk Haze. I had Jelly in my stash, which is a little more green than the Citron sock yarn, but it works. Here are the lined mittens, one with the ilning tugged out:

I used the same size needles for the lining, but picked up the stitches at the end of the ribbing. When knitting the mitten, you increase four stitches at the end of the first band of stars, so this means that my lining has four stitches less than the mitten. I figured that would help it slide inside more easily. Similarly, for the thumbs, I put 11 stitches on a holder instead of 13, so my thumbs in the lining have 4 stitches less than the mitten thumbs. I also knit the linings a little bit shorter: 4 rows shorter for the mitten and 2 rows shorter for the thumb. When the lining is pushed inside the mitten, it puffs a bit at the cuff as a result.

The cool thing about lining mittens like this is that there are no ends visible or even carried threads in the fair isle that can be snagged. Everything is sealed between the mittens. To do this, I finished all the ends on the mitten, then knit the main body of the lining. I pulled the tip of the mitten through the hole for the thumb once the top had been sewn with Kitchener stitch, and wove in the ends. After the thumb was done, I worked the end in from the right side, then pushed the needle through the work to leave the end inside.

This lining is lovely and squishy, but maybe a bit thicker than it needs to be. You can see that when I picked up the stitches at the cuff, I first knit with a strand of Citron and a strand of Jelly held together. That seemed too thick and was a bit stiff. I tried with a single strand of the Kidsilk Haze and thought it was too thin, so used the KSH double. In hindsight, the single strand probably would have been fine.

I used just over a ball of KSH for the linings, which mean that I could have lined the mittens with a little over half a ball if the yarn had been single. That’s good to know!