Presents revealed

Finally knitting life can get back to normal. Seven homemade gifts and a shawl for me were ready by Christmas Eve. Some have been seen here earlier, but a few were not ready before we left the house last week. Here are a few late entries:















This is a family kit in soft, 100% wool Visjö by Östergötlands ullspinneri. Mother gets wrist warmers in crochet with two colours and loops designed by Maria Gullberg for the Hemslöjden magazine and her new book. Father gets the Henry scarf from Knitty fall 07, but with this yarn I got away with five repeats instead of seven for 20 x 160 cm. The son will be very warm in Katarina Brieditis' wasp design. My own kids have hats in blue and purple and they wore them all last winter. The mother hinted that she liked all the pieces and might be wearing them as a set...

The next picture is from the singing and dancing we did before opening the presents. I'm wearing my new Sea Silk shawl in Sangria red. There will be a better picture, and maybe a pattern, later. (Click the picture to make it bigger)

Busy, busy

This month has been very hectic, knitwise and otherwise. One birthday party, one knitting party, one Christmas market day... and that was just one weekend. Most of the knitting this time of year is secret as well, so I hope I can reveal all next week. At least five knitted gifts and one in crochet await wrapping at the moment, and the Sea Silk shawl for me is almost done. Back to work.

Have a great Christmas and see you soon!

I'm in love

Sometimes a pattern just hits you, and this one is a dream come true for me. Go check out Jeanie!

Shawl plans

I'm not going to tell you all about may planning of the Sea Silk shawl, but here are at least my conclusions.

• one skein will have to be enough at this prize
• make it as large as possible
• triangular rather than rectangular
• have some solid parts to show of the yarn
• the colour isn't right for leaves etc. in the pattern
• geometrical but not boring
• easy to memorize and not too slow

And here is the pattern sample (in baby acrylic):

















The pattern was found here . The original is rectangular and I spent all of last night making it triangular. I got stuck trying to work from side to side, but that didn't work at all. When the children were in bed my brain started working again and the pattern worked out just perfect from the point and up with only minor modifications. The edges will not look quite like this, but that is easier to fix. Teddy Brown was a good model, but he then passed the shawl on to Barbie who is using it as a turban at the moment. Now I'm ready for SILK!

Grey and colours

Finally! Since last Thursday the members of my family have been fighting a bad cold. Today I found the energy so assemble my Russian coat, and it looks almost as planned.





























The change I made from the original pattern was to shorten it. Instead of 412 sts for the skirt made as five large triangles meeting at center back, this version has 290 sts in the bottom half and triangles only at the front. Definitely easier to wear. The sleeves are a bit too long, but there is one blocking left to do and if that doesn't help it should be easy to fold them in since there is no hem.

Lately I have made three grey knits (one is an X-mas secret), and COLOURS are badly needed. The leftovers from the Rainbow socks have gotten some company in apple green. It is Regia stretch and this will become socks, or most likely double knit gloves...














The other colour temptation is a skein of Handmaiden Sea Silk in Sangria. For about a month I have been looking through my books and searched the internet for the perfect pattern, and I'm getting closer... There is a sample in progress and if it works I'll cast on tomorrow.

Hexagons completed

The fun is over. This is the sholder and sleeve section of the Russian coat. I decided to block it before sewing the sleeve seams and picking up the collar, because it was very bubbly and wierd looking. Now it is more presentable and I hope it stays that way when it dries. I've made an attempt to get the shades of gray symmetrical, but other than that I'm true to the pattern so far. My yarn is very different from the original though, it is probably much softer and to get 19st/10cm I use needles 4mm instead of 6mm as the pattern says. I hope the end result will work out well anyway, as I'm thinking more of a shrug than a coat.

Here is a closer look:















I found a picture of the finished Russian coat here. I'm not going to make the back that long, because I don't think it would look good on me and I don't want to buy more yarn. So far I've used almost 2/3 of the 600g in my stash. Besides, it was the shoulder section that caught my eye and it is stunning enough with a shorter back. I will shorten the pattern by knitting a triangle at each side but make the hem straight at the back.

When I ran out of hexagons yesterday I started on another Christmas project. After Cina's complaints about the endlessness of Henry I decided that it would provide mindless, bring-along knitting for a long time. The yarn is my favourite, Visjö by Östergötlands ullspinneri, and it might become a little bigger than the original, but not much.

Knitting for pleasure

Lately I've been needing to knit to reduce stress. Finishing things and being useful and productive come further down the list. This weekend I started on a true feel good project. I even missed my knitting so much when I took a bath on Sunday that I asked Mr P to get it for me, but it wasn't very comfortable. I would also like to be able to knit in bed, but that doesn't work either.








So what is it? I brought it with me to knit during my daughters gymnastics on Monday night, and after that I went to my music group, and during coffee I pulled out something that looked like this.















Faces lit up around the table when someone suggested it was a nursing bra for cold days, but no. All the pieces I've made so far look like this.















And the correct answer is Russian coat by Norah Gaughan from Vogue Knitting holiday issue 2007 that I recieved last Friday. The yarn I'm using is a great wool yarn from Yllet, that I bought in Gotland last year. Since that is an island halfway between Sweden and Russia that somehow felt appropriate for this model, even though it was ment for a big shawl.

I have been a little practical too lately, and worked the pattern section of the Icelandic lambs wool sweater. Someone is actually waiting for this one, so it would be nice to get it done. I don't like knitting charted patterns like this with long floats to handle all the time, but now it is done and the rest is made in the small pattern repeat.