I love working on Children's projects... for several reasons. The cute factor is overwhelming! I love that for kids, you can use the brightest colors available! You can also be as creative as you want. If you can dream it up, you can do it. And the best part - children's projects are small enough to finish in a reasonable amount of time, so there is lots of instant gratification.

For this little set, I was asked to make mittens and a hat for a 4 year old little boy... who like most little boys, has a thing for alligators. this began the search for the perfect shade of Alligator Green! Normally, I gravitate towards wool products, but for this project I chose a nice soft acrylic (mainly for the indestructibility factor) and Vanna's Choice had a lovely mossy bright green.

I set to work to find a hat that would be stylish, keep ears warm, but also be functional for everyday winter wear. I had been admiring Thorpe (available as a free pattern... follow the linky) for a long time, and had eventually intended to make one from handspun yarn for myself... This seemed the perfect opportunity. I made a few modifications (2 extra increase rows at the crown) to account for the fact that I was using a basic worsted weight yarn instead of a bulky one, and added a few stitches to the earflaps to account for the extra stitches... but other than that, I worked the pattern mostly as written and was very satisfied with the results.

I always find it challenging to make hats for children because of the variety in head size... Maybe now that I'm going to have a child sized noggin at home I will be a bit more fearless? I consulted a bunch of different patterns to try and make sure that this would fit properly. I think I did ok in the end, because the Mom was pleased with the fit.

And of course... the star attraction - Alligator Mittens! When we were little I remember my Grandma making dinosaur/lizard mittens with tiny yarn, and them being quite complicated to make and not as functional as regular mittens. For this reason, I chose to make just a basic regular mitten, and then embellish with eyes and teeth. I hope that the little guy can play and use them as his everyday mittens this winter, so I wanted them to be comfortable, and perfectly adapted for making snowballs and general seasonal antics. Also, because they are acrylic... they are fully washable :)

I added crocheted eyes with black French knot pupils, and duplicate stitched teeth along the underside of the mitten. It was hard to photograph the tooth effect without having the proper sized hands to fit inside the mittens... but you get the idea. I hope there will be lots of "RAWR" moments and "love bites" with these mittens.