Mission completed

My youngest son asked me for some fingerless mittens quite awhile ago. I made him many socks and other things, but still he requested fingerless mittens. I tried finding a pattern that would work, tried telling him about all the other things I could make or him. He still insisted on fingerless gloves, 'in red please'. So a couple of weeks ago, I took out the Cascade 220 tweed (in red!) that he had picked out last spring. I patted myself on the back for using the pattern from Weekend Knitting (I would be in heaven if I ever used every single pattern in every single book I have bought. Of course by the time I get around to all of them, I probably will be in heaven. I'm sure that God allows knitting in heaven, right?). I used my Brittany double point needles (love those) and knit away. Never mind that it was a bit big, Cascade felts.
Well, I eventually returned to reality and realized that it wouldn't work. I tried again to show my son all the other stuff I could knit. ('How about another pair of mittens? They are cool. Look, socks! Do you want another headband? Well, it must be your day! Mommy can knit toys now!'). He still wanted these red fingerless mittens. So, I took a deep breath and confronted the real issue. I was scared. Seriously. Fingerless mittens? They look like so much work, all those half fingers. I had survived the hand-part when I knit the mitten way too big. What if I couldn't pass his ideal? What if I failed and his idea of me as the 'can-knit-anything-and everything' mom was destroyed? Yes, it was your good-old-fashioned fear that was preventing me from knitting these red fingerless mittens.
So after this soul-searching realization I took a deep breath and pulled out some red sock yarn and size 2 needles. I took my Weekend Knitting book and started over. This time the mitten was coming out the right size. I came to the finger part, I thought of my son and took a deep breath. And you know what? It wasn't hard, 4 fingers appeared where they were supposed to and the thumb followed. Look!!!

They are completed and my son loves them. I'm trying to ignore the fact that my oldest son has now asked for a pair too. I'm also ignoring that they are not perfect. The important thing is that after 20+ years of knitting, I finally made a pair of fingerless mittens.
(the bag in the background is from a friend who was just in the Middle East)