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Project details: Hanna's Bunny mittens
Pattern: Loosely based on the red mittens in Red Mittens by Toshiyuki Shimada in the book Northern European Knit Accessories 北欧のニットこものたち (loosely based because I simply don't read Japanese well enough to understand the directions completely).
Yarn: Sirdar Sublime 75% merino, 20% silk and 5% cashmere (Can it get any better? The yarn is lovely and I'll use it again).
Needles: Inox bamboo 3,5 mm dpn
Modifications: The ears are made loosely according to the directions from craftzine.com. I did cast on 7 stitches, and increased until I had 12 stitches.
Look, she is wearing Chuck's cabled socks, still going strong!
About Stockholm: I, the girls and the dogs moved to Stockholm in July last year. We have been living in Bromma, which is a part of Stockholm, and more exactly, in lovely Södra Ängby. The area consists of over 500 houses, build in the 1930's in pure functionalism. They are like sugar pieces dropped in the woody landscape. It's fascinating walking in the area, and incredibly beautiful (if you, like me, see beauty in the style).
An old pine near close to our house did break in the storm during Christmas
The house in Södra Ängby is rented. We wanted to explore the area more before we decide where we will settle down, and in the end of last year we found "our" house. It's a small house, not far from where we are living now, in an area also buit in the 1930's. The houses are like the Finnish "Rintamamiestalo", but were built ten years before the Finns started with the same concept, based on the Swedish model. The idea was enable people to build their home by them self, based on a standardized model. The houses in Norra Ängby are of twelve different models, and of them are seven common. A street was always designed with the same model of houses, and the area is thus very common in style. The yards are extremely well kept and the houses neat. It's a little bit like walking in one of the children book author Astrid Lindgrens's books.
Our new surrondings.
It has been a long time since last, and to be honest, I had to look up my password to Movable Type, in order to type this post. A lot of time has passed by, and almost non knitting has been done. I have started a couple of cowls, miserable, half inspired projects, abandoned them and put the needles to rest again. A lot of thing have happened, more about that later.
I think it started in the beginning of December this year. My mother mailed me an article from Helsingin Sanomat, the big Finnish newspaper, featuring Arne and Carlos and their Christmas balls. I did in fact knit two, but I have not yet come around to fill them up (have no real wool) and lightly felt them. Well perhaps for next Christmas ;) Then we had my husbands lovely nice visiting later in December. She mentioned that she would very much have a pair of handknitted mittens for Christmas. Nice idea I thought , but didn't do anything more about it. But after Christmas I suddenly found myself flipping through knitting books and webpages... In the search for the perfect pattern for Jenny I decided to test if I still like knitting mittens, and so I started a pair with stash yarn and a pattern from Anna Zilboorg's book Magnificent mittens. My gauge was, as it always has been with Anna's pattern, way off and I had to improvise somewhat. But the good thing is, the old knitting love was there, it felt good figuring out what to do and how. And knitting is like bicycling, the fingers new exactly what to do, how to keep tension and so on even though it has been three years since I made something more complicated.
This first pair goes to my daughter Sofia. The girls were immediately thrilled when they found out there's once again a possibility to get handknitted mittens, and Hanna ordered a pair with bunny ears. I have decided on colours, yarn and pattern for Jenny's mittens, the yarn is already ordered from Strikk, and I have started knitting the bunny mittens. But I didn't dare to post about the first pair until I knew they were done and all right, in fear of posting once again a “Hey, I'm knitting again” and then letting the blog once again die.
Here are some pictures and project info. The weather here in Stockholm, Sweden*, is right now very grey, and it makes it difficult to get good pictures. But here we go:
Project info: Sofia's mittens
Pattern: 5-1 from Anna Zilboorgs's book Magnificent Mittens
Needles: Addi 2,5 mm metal
Yarn: Dark grey Rauma Röros 100 % wool
Light grey and green: Isager Tvinni held doubled, 10 % wool
Modifications: The mitten is knitted from the top down, but the thumb from the bottom up. My gauge was so off the I didn't dare to start the thumb from the top. Instead I moved the thumb stitches to a thread, and casted on with the same amount of live stitches. Result: an invisible start for the thumb. The dark grey edge at the sides of the mittens should have been striped, I realized this too late, and decided to not rip up what I had knitted (afraid the fragile knitting love could have got hurt in the process, casting on with Anna's method is somewhat tricky).
Unblocked.
Silly close up complete with bonsai and Afghanhound to the left.
Modeled on my way too big hand. And yes, it's Autumn Rose I'm wearing.
The beginning of the bunny mitten. Merino, cashmere and silk, can it get better?
* Since my last post has a lot of things happened. My husband got a job offer he just couldn't refuse, and moved in the summer of 2010 to Stockholm in Sweden. I remained in Finland with our children for one more year due to the education of the children, and then in the summer of 2011 I and the girls moved to Stockholm. Our sons are grown up, and decided to stay in Finland, at least for now. Stockholm is a lovely city, and it's absolutely fantastic to live in a country where your mother tongue is the main spoken language (in Finland are only about 4% of the Finns speaking Swedish, so the difference is huge). I do miss my sons, my parents and in-laws, and a handful of friends very much, but the distance to Finland is short, and I have had the possibility to visit them several times already. My parents and the sons did also spend Christmas in Stockholm, which was lovely. Out dog pack has also grown with one, and the Afghans are now three. Olivia the canary did remain in Finland, and moved to my parents house, much to my niece Maya's joy.
More on Stockholm in next post! Stay tuned!
]]>Almost there! Modelled pictures of the mittens as soon as I get the ends woven in and the mittens blocked. Soon!
Edit per 2012: No modeled pictures, but finally pictures of the finished mittens:
Close up of the flowers
And that was also the end of Ribby card. One day when I came home had Ludde, the Afghan, had a ball with Ribby cardi. One sleeve was thorn in pieces, and the house was decorated with yarn. No chance to get the yarn to be enough for a new sleeve, and it had to be rewound anyway. So I ripped everything, wound it up in new balls and let it sit for a while. A couple of months ago I felt a small knitting urge lifting it's head, and after a lot of Ravelry search I found the pattern for Sassymetrical by Gay Schiff. Sassymetrical is knitted from the top down, and this is in fact my very first top down sweater! So, her we go, Pictures and info:
Project info:
Pattern: Sassymetrical by Gay Schiff
Yarn: Rowan RYC Cashsoft Aran SH014 (grey)
Needles: Addi 4,5 mm circular needles.
Almost off the needles already are the Urban Necessity mittens by Colleen Michele Meagher. My daughter wanted a pair of mittens that enables her to handle the bus ticket without problems, but are still warm. The Urban necessity mittens have a cap over the fingers, and fingers without tops. Handy! The yarn is Schoeller + Stahl Ronda, and I'm using 3,5 mm dpns in bamboo. Both mittens are knitted, and I have today started to knit the first cap.
The second pair I have on the needles are the Vinterblomster mittens by Heidi Mork. I'm using Vuorelma's Satakieli yarn for these mittens, in deep brick and ochre colours, on 2,5 mm dpns. This are intended for my younger daughter, but I'm not sure about the size, might be that they end up in my mitten basket. I'm just about to start the thumb gusset on the first mitten.
Here is a close up of the pattern. The observant knitter familiar with the pattern might observe that there is one flower less than intended in the second border. I forgot to increase stitches after the first border, but didn't realize it until I didn't get the main pattern to work out. So I ripped only a couple of rows and increased instead after the second border. The missing stitches were just the amount the last flower would have needed.
]]>Summary of this mitten project: My gauge was totally off, but otherwise a very nice outcome. The pattern is very clear and well written, and I made few alterations. The major one was that I picked up thumb stitches from the contrast colour yarn in the previous row, not MC, and then I attached the cuff lining at the same time as I knitted the first grey row off the braid (simply pick up the cast-on row on a spare needle, and knit the cast-on stitch together with the live stitch you have on your ordinary needle). I like how the mittens look.
Project details:
Pattern: Deep in the Forest mittens by Tuulia Salmela.
Yarn: Vuorelmas Satakieli, 2ply 100 % wool in off white and grey (957).
Needles: 2,5 mm dpns.
Modelled pictures as soon as the weather clear up!
And P.S.: I have cast on two new pairs of mittens, and the first thing I will do next year is to make an order for yarns to several bigger projects ! Yes! But this year I try to finish the mittens and the Ribby cardi.
]]>In the end, I liked the pattern by Kate Gilbert very much, and I can't understand why it was so difficult in the beginning. The socks knitted up beautifully on 2,5 mm dpns, and the pattern shows a clear stitch definition. The pattern is well written and very clear. I like the start toe a lot, and since I'm a big fan of flap heel socks, I liked the heel too. The only alteration I made was to decrease a bit sharper for the toe, but that was only because I had knitted the patterned part too long, and I didn't want to have the sock too long. And I was too lazy to frog. The pattern didn't need this alteration.
Project details:
Pattern: Marina piccola socks by Kate Gilbert.
Yarn: VillaSukka by VillaMokka.
Needles: 2,5 mm dpns.
Oh no, she moved her toes again!
* We have had rain and clouds for weeks, really almost a rainy reason. Haven't felt like winter at all.
I started to knit as soon as the Piccola marina socks were finished (they are now blocking), and realized very soon that mu gauge of some reason is totally off. I have knitted with this yarn and these needles a lot, but obviously the straight lines and my afraidness of stranding too tight on the backside led to a much looser knit than I usually do. Result: these mittens will be suitable for my older son, whose hands are just a tad smaller than my husband's. Good part: he needed new mittens too. Bad part: still no mittens for me.
The mittens look very uneven on these pictures, but it comes from the straight lines, the colour change is on exactly same place row after row. They will even out when blocking. The braid was fun to knit, as always, and Tuulias description on how to do it is very straight forward and clear. I'm using Vuorelma's Satakieli yarn and 2,5 mm dpns. The only alteration I so far has done was to pick up the stitches for the thumb gusset from the grey, or contrast colour, yarn on the backside, not from the main colour yarn. I got visible stitches on the right side when using the mc, but that can of course have come from making some other mistake when picking up the stitches. Anyway, it's very neat now.
And finally an update on the Ribby cardi: I have located two balls of grey in the right dye lot, and I'm waiting for them to be shipped to me. I have knitted the body and almost the entire first sleeve. As soon as the yarns arrive I'll continue.
The pattern for the Wabi Sabi scarf is by Kamicha, and Kamicha is kind enough to give it out as a free pattern. Thank you Kamicha! The pattern repeat is only for rows, and very easy. An absolute extra is the beautiful knotted fringe. The scarf is knitted lengthwise, and you need a long, about 100 cm circular needle to manage the amount of stitches. The fringed is created at the end/beginning of the row every time you turn the work around. The scarf is long, about two meters, and I used about one and a half skein of Kochoran.
It's a bit cloudy outside, so I talked Hanna into modeling the scarf inside instead, and she agreed, but was not overly enthusiastic in showing her modeling skills. Anyway, some kind of pictures of the finished scarf got taken. But what is not showing of very well is how the colours work in the scarf. The idea is that there is not supposed to be any pooling, the scarf is about as long as one colour repeat of the yarn. I must have started a bit into the first colour, since I managed to get a small pooling effect in both ends of the scarf. It doesn't disturb me since it's symmetrically, and is quite beautiful. Still, it would have been nice to get the colour sequences right, but I had knitted quite a lot before I realized about the pooling. And Kochoran is pretty hairy, so I decided against ripping up it all.
Here is a close up of the end and the fringe. Kamicha's pattern has instructions for both a shawl and a throw, or to be more exact, yarn amounts for those, since they are made by just knitting more repeats.
I was a bit afraid the yarn would be itchy, but it turned out being very nice against the skin, and I have already have use for the scarf several times. We have got some kind of first feeling of the winter here in south Finland, with a couple of millimeters of snow on the ground and a couple of minus degrees. Lovely!
]]>I had some problems grasping the graph for the pattern, I don't know why, since it's hardly ever a problem of mine. A slight problem was also that I did knit quite infrequently on the leg portion, and managed to forget the pattern in between. Fortunately, after having understood it, it usually took a row or two to get it again. Here is a close up of the winding path between the waves of the sea, a beautiful pattern I think.
The cuff is knitted on 2 mm dpns, and the rest on 2,5 mm. Today I have promised to take my friend's son to his piano lesson, and I think I'll have plenty of time to set up the second sock while waiting for him. In fact, the foot part of the first sock was knitted in less than a week, so I think the second one will finish pretty smoothly too.
]]>And now over to the knitting. Let's not dwell over the fact that its months since I last updated, and instead concentrate on the knitting: The fabulous Ribby Cardi by Bonne Marie Burns. I'm knitting the all ribbed version.
I had 8 balls of beautiful charcoal grey Cashsoft Aran (colour SH 014, dye lot 19D5), and thought it would be enough. Well, it will probably be one ball too little. I have knitted the fronts, and I'm halfway on the back, and it looks a little alarming. I already checked with the shop I bought the yarn from, and they don't have more of it in this dye lot, the dye lot they have has a quite different shine, and is out of question. If I don't relocate one or two balls more, I'll have to decide on another colour for the sleeves, which isn't an impossible idea, even if I had a one coloured Ribby Cardi in mind.
Here is a picture proof of the knitted and folded fronts:
I have started a pair of socks in a beautiful aqua blue colour, but I didn't manage to get any good pictures of tat project, so it will have to wait for better light and a post of its own.
]]>First up are the Snicket socks. The socks are knitted on 2,5 mm dpns, with VillaMokka's yarn Mokkasukka (75 % wool, 25 % nylon) in the colourway Viimeinen kejsari (Finnish for The last Emperor). The yarn is a hand painted one, and beautiful. You can look at more of Villamokka's yarns at her blog. The Snicket socks pattern is a nice one, well written, and as I mentioned the short row heel I so far like the best of all I've tried. It was first published in MagKnits, but is now available as a free download in Ravelry. In the smallest size they are perfect for my younger daughter, with a shoe size 37.
The Snicket pictures are from the east terrace of the house on the island, but it started to rain before I finished the Latvian socks, and we pictured them here at home.
The pattern for the Latvian socks is to be found in Nancy Bush's book Folk socks. I have again used Mokkasukka yarn, this time in the colourway Iris. The picot cuff is knitted on 2,5 mm dp needles, the rest on 2 mm needles. I used almost all of the 100 gram hank of yarn, and I must admit I had a slightly scary feeling when knitting the toe of the socks. It looked like so little left. The socks were intended for my mother, and she will get them as a thank you for taking care of Ludde while we were on the archipelago holidays. But they suits me very well too, and I have 38 in shoe size. A very nice pattern this too, as Nancy's usually are, they fit my foot very well.
I couldn't decide which pictures from the archipelago to post, so I a put them all in
an album, so you can have a look at more than a couple, click here! These pictures are all taken in the archipelago of Turku, in southwest Finland. It's a beautiful place, and you can see my love for stones and rock formations, I can't stop taking pictures of them. The house on the island is very primitive, with some solar energy, but no running water, and with a nice vegetable plot. It's easy to forget about the troubles at home when over there!
I have been away for a while, spending holiday days in the archipelago with the family. There are no possibilities to blog from there, but there has been plenty of knitting time. The Snicket socks are finished, as are the Latvian socks, and a new project is started. I'll upload pictures of them all, and some beautiful shots from the archipelago tomorrow. Here is a sneak peak, the beautiful short rows on the Snicket sock heel (the best short row heel I've ever managed to make):
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I started a pair of socks, with the intention to give them to my mother as birthday present. I managed to finish the first sock in May, but since Mum's birthday is on May 28th, I had to come up with something else for that, and the second sock is still not even started. The pattern is Latvian socks by Nancy Bush from Folk socks, and they are knitted on 2 mm dpns in a yarn by Villamokka called Mokkasukka in the colourway Iris. The yarn is a German Zitron yarn that is handpainted by Villamokka in Hämeenlinna.
The second Latvian sock has been suffering from the second sock syndrome, and when I finally had more time to think about knitting, I decided that instead of casting on for sock number 2 I would start a new sock. One reason was the weather, we have had a lot of rain, and the yarn I chose is the perfect antidote for rain: an other Mokkasukka yarn, this time in the colourway Viimeinen kejasari, Finnish for The Last Emperor. My girls are fighting over this yarn, but I think the younger one will end up as winner, the Snicket sock will be too small for her sister.
The pattern is the Snicket sock, a design by Sabine Riefler, previously published in MagKnits, but now available as free pattern in Ravelry. I'm knitting size one with 54 stitches on 2,5 mm dpns. And the heel. As you know I'm not a fan of short row heels. All ways now and then I test a new way to knit them, but so far, I haven't found a winner. But this heel is almost perfect, and I think the second sock will be even better, since now I really know what I'm doing. The stitches continue over the heel in a column not broken by the direction change of the heel, simply beautiful. Here is a close up of the heel.
And do not feel sorry over my older daughter, I bought two skeins of this beautiful yarn, she will get a pair of her own, but in an other pattern. I also bought two skeins of a blueish colourway, perfect for my boys. Or for Marina Piccola by Kate Gilberts, a design that reminds me so much of Italy that I'll knit it, sooner or later.
And while knitting these socks I dream of what to knit next. I long for a sweater project, but not a multicolour one, perhaps even something as opposite as charcoal or black... I absolutely need something in those colours. I love the colour of the socks I'm knitting right now, but for myself I feel for something more simple and serene.