Making Fingerless Gloves For Friends - Tutorial included

I'm poor this year so I have to be creative :P

I successfully traded for many of my Christmas gifts, but one friend asked for fingerless gloves and the Etsy shop that she wanted them from was too busy to respond to me and to work out a transaction. I guess they're not big on trades or discounts, but it would have been nice to get a reply. I would have just purchased them outright if she had said no nicely, but the failure to respond turned me off from that shop.
Time passed by, I asked a couple more times, and nothing firm was worked out.
Finally exasperated, I turned to what I knew to be true - I could make them myself. Yes, this is the bane and gift of all talented crafts people. They secretly know they can make a lot of things themselves so it makes purchasing some items either an attempt at saving time, or an act of self deprecation.
Well, I dug into the old yarn stash. I was lacking in colours, but I picked out two that seemed to work well together and got to work. (My room is a cat's paradise right now!)

I had no tutorial or pattern to work from, but I figured I could wing it. I don't use patterns for any of my crochet dolls after all. As you can see from the photos, my attempt was successful! Yippee! I don't know if they will fit her yet so I have my fingers crossed on that, but it's gratifying to know that it can be done - and easily!
In fact, it was so easy that I started on another pair. I can only show you one side for now as the other one is still in progress.

This time around, I studied a picture of a fingerless glove first so the result was more even and smooth.
In case you're wondering how to make the fluffy one (you'll have to excuse my non-crochet pattern lingo), here's how:

Materials:
1 ball of Baby Boucle yarn (or another yarn of your choice)
5.0 MM crochet needle

Base chain: 20 chains for small arms, more for larger arms. Just chain out 20 and wrap it around your arm to see if it fits, then add or minus chains to make it right for you. Join first chain with slip stitch.

Roll this onto you arm to check that it is the right size for you. If not, undo and add/minus some chains. Write down how many chains you needed for the right size so that you remember it for the other glove side later on.

Beginning section up to wrist: Chain 3, then skip one hole, double crochet (DC) in the next hole. Chain 1, skip one hole, DC. Keep doing (Chain 1, Skip one hole, DC) all the way around until you meet up with the first chain 3. Join with a slip stitch. This is where you begin working in rounds.

Go ahead and put a DC using the open hole created where two DC meet. Chain 1, and put a DC in the next open hole. Repeat Chain 1, DC in open hole all the way until you have the length that you want for your fingerless gloves up to the wrist.

Tip: If you're lazy, you can stop now and call it a Wrist Warmer. No one will know :P

Wrist portion (about 2 rows): You want to make the hand part bigger than the arm portion. So instead of one DC in the holes, do 2 DC. But don't do this regularly all around. Add them as you need them to match your hand size. So do a couple holes with 2 DC, put it up to your hand, and switch back to only 1 DC if you find that it's getting too big too fast. Space out your increases so that it's not noticeable. For me, I only increased it about 2-3 times. Keep putting the glove up to your hand to compare the size and shape as you work. Stop when you get to the base of the thumb.

Thumb portion: You need to make a hole for where your thumb will stick out. This is a little bit tricky so pay close attention. At the thumb part of your glove, you want to stop and make some single chains. This could be 4, 5, or more depending on your thumb size. For best measuring, put the glove on, line it up to the base of your thumb, and wrap the chain around to where it will connect on the other side of the glove. Slip stitch it to the other side once you have the right thumb hole size.

Upper hand portion: From here, you will be working around with (DC, single chain, DC in big hole) like the arm portion. Use the thumb hole as one of the big holes to work in, but make sure not to cover it up by accident. Keep working for about 2 more rounds. Compare it to your hand to see how long you want the finger portion to be. I personally like to purposely add a half row on the side closest to the thumb because my fingers angle down towards my pinkie.

Finishing off: When you are ready to stop, use a single crochet (SC) instead of a DC in the last hole. Then you can join with a slip stitch, cut your yarn (leave a little for weaving in), and pull it through your last loop. Weave the remaining length into your glove so that it doesn't hang out or unravel. Do the same with the beginning piece of yarn hanging out.
Try on the glove to see how well it fits. It should fit perfectly if you compared it frequently to your own hand and arm size.

Let me know if you have any questions.
The one I made for my friend is a little bit trickier. Here's the general idea:

Base chain: Base chain of 20 or more, join with slip stitch. Chain 1, (skip one hole. 2 SC in next hole, Chain 1) repeat up to wrist.

Wrist portion: At wrist portion, add extra SC in holes as needed to make glove wider for your palm size.

Thumb portion: You need to make a hole for where your thumb will stick out. This is a little bit tricky so pay close attention. At the thumb part of your glove, you want to stop and make some single chains. This could be 4, 5, or more depending on your thumb size. For best measuring, put the glove on, line it up to the base of your thumb, and wrap the chain around to where it will connect on the other side of the glove. Slip stitch it to the other side once you have the right thumb hole size.

Upper hand portion: Make thumb hole using single chains as described above, then continue in rounds to build up upper portion of hand. If desired, switch yarn colours for finger portion. On the last row, add extra height for the half closest to the thumb by stopping at about the middle finger section. Slip stitch to angle downwards, then work backwards to the opposite half to give that side an extra row (or 2, if desired) of height. Join with slip stitch at the end, cut yarn and pull through last loop, weave ends into glove to prevent unraveling.

Bottom Design: At bottom of glove, use alternate colour and SC in every loop in one round. Join with slip stitch. (2 SC in one hole, chain 1, skip one hole) repeat until you get to the first SC. Join with slip stitch. Join next colour. (2 SC in one hole, chain 1, skip one hole) repeat until join with first SC. Finish off and weave ends in.
There could possibly be errors in this tutorial since I'm no expert at writing crochet tutorials, so this is meant to give you a general idea. If you're used to crocheting, you'll understand what you're supposed to do.

If you're working through this tutorial and you find an error, let me know and I'll make the necessary changes. If you successfully finish this tutorial and make a fingerless glove - congratulations! Send me a pic and I'll post it here.

Don't forget to post photos of your finished work on the Flickr page here.

Happy Crocheting!

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