Fingerless Gloves

Rarely content to simply knit a pattern according to the instructions (I do like to mess with things) I adapted these fingerless gloves from Cailyn Myer's lovely pattern,  Wintergreen Gloves, which is available as a free download on Ravelry. and Cailyn's blog.

I decided to experiment with yarns and snowflakes. I used some very fine charcoal grey cashmere yarn on a cone, which I used double as well as Shetland 2 ply jumper yarn from Jamesion & Smith (grays) as well as alpaca 2 ply lace yarn, which I also used double (maroon/purple) and some silk/merino (lavender) both from Posh Yarns.
Here is the result.
It's a  pretty prototype, but it's not quite what I wanted.

The lavender yarn is too fine in relation to the rest of the glove. It distorts the snowflake by squashing it.

The shading of the grays on the snowflake is a bit abrupt. This pattern would work better if it was knitted in one colour and the background colours were changed and shaded.

The curls of the wave motif at the cuff are in the wrong place and seem to be at odds with the spikes of the snowflake.

The maroon spots are too dark.

So I set about knitting another version.

This is looking more promising. The larger snowflake and the softer shading work quite well. I shortened the cuff and knitted a pattern. I also used 3 strands of the cashmere on this one. It was good enough, so I knitted a pair for myself!

The point I'm trying to make is that it is always useful to knit samples and experiments. If it turns out really horrible, then bin it, but try to work out what went wrong first.