maskerade

Progress on the brown and white cardigan

@brittarnhild

It is some time now since I showed you the child size cardigan I am working on. The main reason is that I have not been knitting much on it lately, due to my painful fingers.

But here I am today, at a two days conference up north in Tromsø, starting the first sleeve.
If my fingers and hands were doing okay I could have managed about half of a sleeve during the meetings today, but as I have to take it slowly, I really am not there. It feels great to have this work between my fingers again though,

and tonight, after dinner, I am sitting in the hotel room, watching the latest Arne&Carlos YouTube episode. And my fingers are actually doing fine. The big star at the bottom of the sleeve is done, I have a narrow border to do, and then the decision on how to make the sleeves. Exactly the same as the body, or something else.

I do think I know what to do.......let´s see tomorrow.

 

A decision to be made

@brittarnhild

Here is the sweater, or cardigan so far. And now it is time to make a decision - what do I want the shoulders to look like. Do I want a row of stars, do I want a row of something different, do I want to continue the patters all the way up? Last night I took a picture and sent out to a few of my friends on snapchat, asking for advice. Well, about have said that I should go for a star, about half said I should not go for a star, one said either or would be great!

So what to do?

I am looking, and looking and looking again, and may be I´ve found the solution.......

 

.......what if I use the border in the front, the one you see twice, running all the way from above the bottom rows. I will let this border continue all the way to the top, but the other stripes, the white and brown ones I will stop a few centimeters before the top, and then knit the front border horisontal. Kind of letting it rest on the shoulder.

Do you see what I mean?
What do you think?

 

 

.......and after that comes the sleeves. How do I want them?

 

How to knit with round needles and two colours

@brittarnhild

Even though I have a knitting break, sort of, the sweater continues to grow. Slowly, slowly, a few rounds every day. Yesterday Marta did some filming while I knitted, so in this video you should be able to see how I knit with two colours.

 

 

 

A knitting break, sort of

@brittarnhild

I have arthritis in my finger. For a long time, for years and years actually, I believed that I could not knit any more. My fingers were too stiff, knitting felt too painful. I did work on socks from time to time, but that was about all. I did miss knitting though, more and more as the years went by, and a few years ago, when I knew I was going to be a grandmother, I decided to try again, to knit more than just socks.

Thus turned out quite well, and soon I was back on the track.

I do tend to exaggerate once I do something I like, and after finishing the red and white sweater for Leander, my fingers were really painful.

My head was spinning with new ideas though, and I could not help myself starting something new.
I did bring this new project, also for Leander, with me to Italy when I went there before Easter, but for weeks I knitted only a few stitches.

Now I have picked up the knitting again. Trying to work more slowly, trying to listen to my fingers when they cry to me, begging me to give them a break. 

And I truly enjoy it!

 

Only God creates perfection

@brittarnhild

I rarely do mistakes in my knitting, and if I do, I usually unravel and do it again.Today I discovered three little mistakes, many rows ago. And I think it will be too much work to unravel

I used to do quilting for many, many years, till arthrosis made my fingers unable to run the quilt needle. I learned something important during my years of knitting though. Not to be too stressed with mistakes. You see, only God creates perfection. The Amish people, who do the most wonderful quilting in the world, even put one or two little mistakes in their work on purpose. ´Cause Only God Creates Perfection.

 

 

 

My work is not perfect, though I do the best I can. I do mistakes.
I am still proud of my work though, and anyway, I do handwork, not machine work.

 

I will let my mistakes  be in the cardigan sweater, and every time I see them I will  remember that this is work of my fingers, and I am proud of it.

 

Saturday morning knit

@brittarnhild

It is Saturday morning, it is March 17th, and this winter seems to be a never ending story. The temperatures are finally predicted to rise a little today though, but the snow is still deep outside and in the green house everything is deeply frozen. I have got a naughty cough, so here I am, indoors, with a fire burning in the fireplace, a huge mug of hot water with lemon and ginger, birds busy out in the feeders, and a knitting which grows and grows and grows.......quite slowly.

I have many unfinished projects waiting, and didn´t actually plan to start this new cardigan sweater now. But then it started to play in my mind all by itself, I drew the first patterns, I bought yarn, I told myself I would just give it a start and then take it with me abroad next week to work on over Easter.......and now I can hardly put it down. The pattern changes all the time, and I want to see the next row only, and then then next, and the next.......you know the feeling, don´t you :-)

I do give myself the luxury of knitting slow though. The intricate pattern means that I can´t knit fast anyway, but I slow it down deliberately as well. Enjoying every stitch, let my fingers be caressed by the yarn, the wool, let my thoughts wander, knitting in a prayer here, purling in a prayer there.

Last night I told Terje: "Now I know what to do in my next career, in my next life! I will be a knitter. A full time hand knitter!"

 

 

I have been working on my vlog the last few days, my YouTube video blog, sorting the videos into playlists. So far I have nine videos in the "My knitting" playlist. You find them all here:

My knitting

 

 

The first stiches

@brittarnhild

After work I went to the yarn shop to buy yarn for the new cardigan sweater. After a little back and forth deciding which colours to use, I believe I found the perfect choice. Three shades of brown, one off white.  After dinner and dishes I found myself in the knitting studio, I couldn´t wait to start the first stitches.

First I had some more patterns to draw, then some filming. But now I will knit the rest of this night, and tomorrow there will be a new knitting video on Britt Arnhild on YouTube :-)

 

A new pattern in the making

@brittarnhild

Almost two weeks since I finished Leander´s sweater. The knitting studio is tidy, UFOs and yarn all sorted. Yes, I do have a million unfinished projects to work on, a ton of left over yarn to use.  I am doing none of it. Instead I am finding paper and pencils, trying to transfer to paper an idea which has played in my mind for some time now.

The newly finished sweater was a lot of work. Thin yarn, thin needles, intricate pattern. The newly finished sweater was a lot of joy. Love and prayers in every single stitch. I can´t deny though that it was hard for my fingers. I have arthrosis. Quite bad for the moment. Knitting is good practice to prevent the fingers from stiffening, but too much knitting provoke inflammations. Knitting the red and white sweater was hard, but I try to be careful, I try to take care. And I would not be without the pleasure. As long as my fingers manage to hold the needles, I will continue to knit.

Tomorrow I plan to buy some new yarn and start playing with this new design. Next week I go to Italy, and just like I did last year, I will work on a garment for my grandson.

 

By the way, here is the YouTube video I posted yesterday.
About my sock collection:

 

 

 

The sweater

@brittarnhild

Done!

 

 

 

The read and white sweater on YouTube

@brittarnhild

The red and white sweater is almost finished :-)