Today, I want to share the little DIY gifts I made for Amaranthe to give to them when I got to meet them before all the lockdowns and such. The band us full of amazing people whose music truly makes my life so much better - and has made me meet people who I want to have in my life for the rest of eternity. To thank the band for this amazing, magical music as well as the friendships I've got to build through the music, I figured I'd create a pair of mittens for each. 

All these patterns are at least based on ones I've found/bought on the internet, some of them I've only changed the color to, some are quite a bit modified. 

Admittedly, this project took a while to complete but I enjoyed every step of the way. I tried to choose colors, patterns and sizes that would fit each band member well, and before handing these to them, I felt I did a decent job. After giving these to their rightful owners, I feel even more so. The feedback from the band was heart-warming, and it encourages me to DIY more for the people I care about. 

Some might think why go through all that trouble since bands get a ton of presents anyway and I'm just a stranger to them, but I think a thoughtful gift is always appreciated and especially when it's a self-made one. Besides, in case the members themselves wouldn't have use for the mittens, I'm sure there are people willing to wear them. A well made mitten always finds a good home.

So, what did I make and for who?

Heart mittens for the lady in the band, Elize, since she is a girly girl and such a sweetheart. This pattern was originally inspired by the Yule god Jolnir, which apparently is another name for Odin, the major god of the old Norse mythology. I thought having Nordic mythology but also switching the colors into borderline unicorn ones would be quite cool. And that's how the mittens for Elize were created. I love this design quite a bit, and she seemed quite happy about receiving these as well. 

The next design was pair of fingerless gloves with embroidered GG6 on them. For those unfamiliar with Amaranthe, GG6 is not only a song by them (and a really good one!), but also a nickname for their growler Henrik - who has a stage shirt with somewhat similar lettering on it, which was my inspiration for these. I hate embroidery to my core, so me going through making these shows actually quite the dedication for the band. The lettering itself took hours upon hours to make and I still feel it could've been done better. (Perfectionist in me has been awakened, haha)

The next pair were a creation for Olof, who plays mainly the guitar but can also master keyboards. Which is why his design has both of those Instruments in it. This pattern was an alteration from a very death metal looking one, but I simplified it down a bit to make it more Olof and make it more Amaranthe. Blue felt like the right color for him so that's why it was chosen to be the base color of it all. 

The next design was a challenge not only for being an intricate one, but also because I tried to makw mittens out of fingerless gloves pattern. I'm still not too sure if the fit on these is quite right, but I'm hoping that if these need fixing, Nils lets me do that for him. (Hello, perfectionism speaking again here!) Why I chose these for the clean vocals man of the band was due to the fact he sings in two somewhat different bands, so he is massively talented in music to keep up with both projects. So basically the design stands for the two main band projects in his life, Amaranthe and Dynazty. Both of which you should check out in case you're unfamiliar with them.

Then there are the design for the bass player Johan. Since I know he's kind of a fellow Finn, it felt right to take inspiration for his mittens from the Finnish nature, more specifically from the "ruska" in Finnish Lapland, which is the time in Autumn when the nature turns all sorts of colorful and looks more stunning than ever. He seemed really pleased with these when I saw him, which truly warms my heart so much. For these, I used the same pattern as for Olof's ones, but altered it even more.

Last but so not least are drum mittens for the drummer of the band, Morten. Again, there was sort of embroidery involved, kind of not as tricky as in Henrik's gloves, but also kind of so much harder. For these, I had to combine 4 things, first a basic mitten pattern for measurements, then the guitar/bass one mentioned below, my own idea for the stripes and then the pattern of the drums that was originally designed for those craft pearls you melt together with iron. If it sounds like quite the project, it sounds like it was. These were probably the hardest pair to make but after seeing he truly liked them (enough to post them on his Instagram), I'm really proud of creating them.

What's the last DIY you've done? Share with me in the comments!

This post seems like the perfect opportunity to share that I'm thinking of sharing a bit more of my DIYs here in the blog as it suits the name, it suits the original idea behind me starting the blog and moreover, it suits me. I will continue having posts about whatever I feel like writing, so at least for now, this won't become a total DIY blog. But also knitting and all that makes my mind calm and helps me relax so I think sharing my latest works could be fun for all of us. If you're more into just style and makeup looks, those will be still found on my Instagram more or less daily, but over here on the blog I want to do a touch different things. So if you're coming from Insta to the blog, you get to know the person behind the pretty pics a little more. I'll see you soon in another post!