During the mass migration of Norwegians to the United States in the 1800s and early 1900s, immigrants were finding ways to blend the culture of their homeland with their new lives in American communities.

One such brave soul was Berta Serina Kingestad, a single mother who settled in Illinois. In an 1889 letter sent home to Norway, Berta asked her family to send her black wool which she could spin with white American wool on a borrowed spinning wheel. She hoped to knit new woolens for her baby, Sven. Learn more about Berta and read her letters in Solveig Zempel’s wonderful book, In Their Own Words: Letters from Norwegian Immigrants. These mittens are knit into a dense fabric for warmth, starting with a Twisted Edge at the cuff, a Norwegian knitting technique less frequently used after the 1930s.