Da vi var I Lofoten I sommer kjøpte jeg garn til sjalet Skymning av Sofia Kammeborn. Har strikket det en gang før, i grønt og blåt på hvor bunn, denne gang ble det to ulike beige-farger samt en lys plommerød. Det var Marit på Gammelbutikken på Kystad som solgte finull, og da jeg så disse fargene sammen visste jeg med en gang at de kom til å bli perfekte i et sjal.
Ble ferdig for noen dager siden, blokket det på baksiden av et lappeteppet og tok det med ut på hytta for å ta bilder av det, og vise det fram i en ny blogg-episode. Hadde egentlig sett for meg at det ville bli flotte bilder med sjalet liggende på et teppe av røsslyng, men det nærmer seg slutten av september, og røsslyngen har forlengst sett sine beste dager. I alle fall her rundt hytta. Så ble jeg bergtatt at det vakre lyset i dag tidlig, etter flere dager med tungt, vått og svært vindfullt vær. Måtte ut og filme og met ett hang skymningssjalet på klessnora med vakker utsikt i bakgrunnen og ble foreviget både på bilder og video.
Burning nettles are growing in our garden. Weeds, most people call them. Not I, not here with us. I let them grow and use them all through the three seasons till winter arrives again. The other day I picked young leaves and made soup, filming the whole process, sharing it in the most precious episode on my YouTube channel. As always I speak Norwegian, but the part where I make soup is completely without words, music only, and can be "read" by everyone.
Some years ago I wrote a legend I call "When God gave the nettle the name burning nettle", where I let the fresh nettle complain to God. It is early spring, the little nettle let his leaves sprout but as soon as he does, the woman is there picking them. The nettle gets angry, very angry and wants to burn the woman. But God is giving him a lesson, letting him know how important his leaves are for the woman, for her children and her husband. In the end God changes the nettles name as a punishment. I read the legend in Norwegian, but here you have the essence :-)
A few year ago I bought a skein of yarn made of nettle fibers. I bought it out of interest, but had no idea how to use the yarn. Then, one day, I got an idea. Why not make a kind of soap shrub, a little bag to keep the soup and hang it in the shower cabinet!
I have made many nettle bags since then. They are perfect as small gifts. Here is one I made this week, a gift for my sister in law for her birthday.
I've made a couple of other birthday gifts as well this week. Cotton pads and wash bags for two of my nieces. Left over yarn, green living, sustainability :-)
And I have fin iced a pair of socks I've been working on. 2 Color Socks by the Argentinian knit designer Joji Licatelli. The pattern can be bought on Ravelry.
As promised I will try to tell you, in English, what I am talking about in the latest YouTube episode. I am sitting in a hotel room in Oslo, and unfortunately most of my photos are in a harddisk which I left at home. So this unravelled Trondheim mitten will have to do :-)
The Norwegian introduction you already know, from a previous post.......
.......welcome to the blue week of lent, and welcome back to my knitting loft ....... I am learning more and more on how to make videos, and slowly I am getting the hold of it. One new thing is that I make chapters in my videos, for different themes ....... chapter Britt Arnhilds skrytealbum, my show and tell album, where I will show you old and knew projects I have made ....... chapter Regnbuestrikk, rainbow knitting ....... chapter Året rundt i Akeleiehagen, all through the year in the Columbine Garden, Akeleiehagen is the name of our garden ....... chapter Bøker på menyen, Books on the menu, where I read from books and talk about one or more knitting books
.......there might be other chapters as well, later, extreme knitting, cabin life, travels and more
.......and then the first chapter starts:
Britt Arnhilds show and tell. - a blue sweater, one of two, which I made for our boys when they were small, and a woven vest. Designed and made by me in the late 80ies - a hat and a "muffe" (I do not know the English name, something where you can warm your hands) I made for Ingrid, our oldest daughter, when she was about 5. Also my own design, but inspired by the knitting book I show you later in the episode - a knitting bag, knitted by Dagmar in Austria. She knitted it for my 50th birthday. Dagmar lives on a dairy farm in Austria, and I spent some time there when I was writing my book about Lent - in the bag I have the Trondheim Mittens. I had planned to have them all done for this episode, but discovered I had done something wrong in the counting and had to unravel a lot! - now a secret. I have started to knit myself a cardigan, with a row of roses, inspired my the roses on Sofia Kammeborn´s Longing for Gotland sock pattern. The secret is that I have not knitted a garment for myself for more than 20 years. I am a big woman and have convinced myself that I am too big to wear anything hand knitted. Now I have decided to change this, not my weight, but how I look upon myself, and I am working on this cardigan. YEAH!!!!! It feels good :-)
.......Rainbow knit. I continue to knit on the rainbow shawl, now the blue colours. And while I knit I continue to talk about knitting the first garment for myself in such a long time. Sharing the secret was kind of hard, made me sweat, and I had to lift my hair up from my neck ;-) Now the secret is out, and I am knitting the rose cardigan. Back to the shawl. There are about 350 stitches on the needles now, and it is still growing: .......I have made a group and a thread on Ravelry for those who want to take part in the rainbow KAL (contact me if you are interested to learn more about it)
.......showing the rainbow socks, talking about the difference between indigo and violet .......the prize for the KAL will be my book of Lent (which is in Norwegian only)
.......Året rundt i Akeleiehagen.......for Norwegian and English speaking listeners equal :-)
.......Books on the Menu, which is impossible to translate
I hope this is of help for you. If you like my videos, please subscribe to my account.
Så rakk jeg jammen å strikke enda ei lite jakke til lillebror før han ble født. denne gang ei #jungeldyrjakke Kom over bukse og smekke på et marked på Tenerife nyttårshelga, og kunne selvsagt ikke stå imot.
Yes, I manage to make one more cardigan for little brother before he was born, this time a #jungeldyrjakke, a jungle animal cardigan. I found the bib and the pants at an outdoor market in Tenerife, and had to buy it, of course :-)
Jakka er strikka i nesten samme fasong og mønster som traktorstripejakka. Lett å strikke, og så blir den kjempetøff synes jeg.
The cardigan is knitted in almost the same pattern as the tractor cardigan I've shown you earlier.
Så har den fått ei lita sølvhekte helt øverst. Den er laget av sølvsmed Elin Vogler Berg, og jeg kjøpte den for snart 36 år siden, da Torgeir var baby. Så er det brukt på små bunadsskjorter mm av alle våre fire barn.
The little silver buttons were made almost 36 years ago, when Torgeir, our oldest son, was a baby, by a friend of mine.
Når barnebarnet på knapt tre år spør om bestemor kan strikke nisselue, legger bestemor vekk alt annen hun strikker på, setter seg ned ved tegneborder, tegner mønster, finner fram garn og strikkepinner og setter i gang.
På et gammelt broderimønster finner jeg små nisser. Egentlig en lenke med nisser og snømenn hånd i hånd, men jeg bruker bare nissene, speilvender den ene og får dermed en søt liten nissebord.
Luen er ikke helt ferdig enda, bare nesten, men så har jeg i dag laget en ny pod på YouTube hvor nisseluen inngår, så da måtte jeg bare blogge litt om den også :-)
When my grandson, almost three, asks if bestemor can knit a santa cap, bestemor puts away all her other projects, sit down to draw a pattern, find yarn and needles and start knitting. In an old embroidery pattern I find santas and snowmen hand in hand. I use just the santa, mirror two and two and have a row of dancing nisser. The cap is not quite finished yet, just almost, but since I made a new podpost on YouTube today, where the nisselue, santa can, is part of the pod, I could not help myself but make a nisselue blog post as well :-)
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:
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:
All texts and photos by Britt-Arnhild Wigum Lindland
maskerade
maskerade
The first step is always the most exciting.
I am sitting in a small hotel room, somewhere in Norway. I am knitting, and all of a sudden I knew it was time to start a knitting blog.
Maskerade, masquerade, playing with words as maske is the Norwegian word for a knitted stich, rad is a row. Knitted stich in a row - maskerade.
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