My son has lost two pairs of mittens this year. Keep in mind - we don't live in a particularly harsh climate. We had a 2-day cold snap in October during which he lost last year's pair that still fit; more recently we've had chilly weather (including a couple of nights in the upper 20s) for about 10 days now and he lost the OLD pair of too-small mittens.
So I started some mittens on Monday. And they didn't want to be knitted. The thumbs were weird, then the hands were too small for the boy's hands - which I should have known, he has hands like mine and he can already span nearly an octave on the piano.
So I threw in the towel with that particular yarn and dug out a ball of handspun so old I have no idea if it's my handspun. Yesterday between after-breakfast chores and a 3pm departure I knitted both mittens, darned in ends and scoured them out. The thumbs are a bit disproportional, but he asked for roomy thumbs for some reason, so I obliged.
Here is a pic of the finished mittens, natural sheep color. Whatever this wool is, it takes well to being abused during a handwash and then tossed in the dryer: it fulled just a bit and fluffed out nicely. I wish I had more of it :D