Yellow favourite!

I have a new favourite yellow cardigan! 

Yarn from Easyknits bought at Edinburgh Yarn Festival. The colour is amazing, and the yarn is lovely, a mixture of 55% Exmoor Blueface, 25% White Wensleydale, 10% Grey Wensleydale and 10% Zwarbles 

The pattern is Sherbet, by Katya Frankel. Well written and easy to follow pattern. The lace pattern is decorative and super simple, learnt after the first repeat. I love the vintage feel of it, and absolutely recommend the pattern. 

Btw, in case someone wonders - my lovely grey shawl, also in yarn bought at EYF 2016, that was lost, has reappeared: Somebody did not pay attention when the moved my bike down under the terrace when the snow came. 

Sunny Easter Tunic

I didn't plan this project. 

The yarn was meant for something else,

a new design

so far only in my head.

I started, but realized, 

the colours had too little contrast 

for what I had in mind. 

The needle size I had brought

was wrong too.

So I ripped it, and changed my plans.

The Lady Marion Tunic 

is a very cute,

and well written pattern. 

It calls for fingering yarn,

so I had to make some modifications, 

working with a thicker yarn,

Rauma Mitu, a wool/alpaca blend.

I think it worked out quite nicely.

I'm surprised this pattern 

does not have more projects on Ravelry.

It's published in English and Danish.

It's perfect for stash busting.

Butterfly tunic

More than twenty years ago, a good friend of mine made me a yellow butterfly summer top. It was a swap, I sewed her a skirt, she didn't know how to handle a sewing machine at the time.

The skirt is long gone, but I've kept the top, even though I haven't used it much. It was cute, but a bit to short for my belly...


Since then, my friend has learnt to sew. In easter, during her dress exhibition, I was inspired to turn the old top into a tunic, using an old college sweater from my father and some lace ribbon.

Redesign is fun! My friend has an Epla shop now (Epla is the Norwegian version of Etsy).

Have a look!

Sunflower Audrey - summer accomplishment

I'm so happy with how this turned out!
The yarn is verye nice to work with,
and the pattern
by Gudrun Johnston from Twist Collective
is a joy to follow.

Pattern: Audrey In Unst by Gudrun Johnston
Yarn: Pickles Extra Fine Merino
Colour: "Solsikke" - Sunflower
New skills:
Bias bind off, three needle bind off,
and sleeve cap shaping
with wraps and turns, top down
- the construction is just brilliant!

(The photos are pre-washing)

"Estrenando mis pájaros amarillos"

"Wearing my yellow birds for the first time!"

In Spanish they have one word meaning "wear for the first time" - estrenar. I like that! We don't have a similar word in Norwegian, and, as far as I know, not in English either (correct me if I'm wrong!)

So here I am, wearing my yellow birds:

This was such a fun knit (apart from the currogated ribbing, that is). I can see why Jettshin has made so many. I have another one in my head - but there are other projects to finish first...



My gauge is 23 for the body (needles 2,5 mm) and 28 for the yoke (needles 3,0 mm). It sounds like a huge difference, but the fit is perfect. The yellow yarn from Ninukka is a little thinner than Wollmeise, but it doesn’t matter, I think.

This was my first project with Wollmeise, and I do see why people love the yarn som much. My problem is that we have a meeting at work every Friday morning when the shop updates, so it's hard to get. We might have to change our meeting time...

EDIT June 26: For some reason, the commenting link on this post is invisible, but the comments are still there, and you can still click on the where the link is supposed to be, and make a comment. Don't know what's happening to Blogger - any ideas?

Trying on my yellow birds!

It's such a fun knit!!

I'm so happy with the colours.

The purple is Wollmeise.

The contrasting colours are from Ninukka (etsy shop).

Knitting in colour - y e l l o w

A new post in the "Knitting in colour"-series inspired by Judith. And the colour is yellow! I notice that many say pass, - sorry, I don't have any yellow projects. But I do - yellow used to be my favourite colour. As a child, I felt that an outfit without yellow in it, was really dull, I felt grey without something yellow, as if the yellow would lighten me up as the sun.

I'm actually knitting in yellow at the moment: This is my Easter knitting that I mentioned in my postcard in the last post.

I don't use as much yellow as I did as a child, and I do worry that this Audrey in Unst-cardigan will be too yellow... but we'll see. The pattern is from Twist Collective autumn 2009, and the designer is Gudrun Johnston. Pickles sold their "Easter-coloured" yarn with 20% discount, and on an impulse, I bought this Sunflower yarn. I had been looking for yarn for this cardigan for a while, and this fine merino yarn had the right weight.

But I have some finished projects, too:

Textured Tweed Clutch, by Mari Lynn Patrick,

from Interweave Crochet, Fall 2005.

(Click on the photo for details.)

My own design, the yellow scrap gnomy.

(Click on photo for details.)

And last, but not least, my Corset Tank Top , by Annie Modesitt .

Click on the photo if you're interested in the details.

Congolese tunic and Mama's lace

I bought this lovely fabric in Congo (Brazzaville) in 1988. I made a dress, that I used to like a lot, a big sack with shoulder pads, as you might guess, at some point I stopped liking it. But I still loved the fabric, so I decided to turn it into a tunic. I sort of removed the central part of the dress; I cut it right under the bust, and then sewed on the bottom part of the skirt. I made a V-neck and added a velvet ribbon and some flower buttons. It was still a bit wide, so I knitted a lace to hold it in a bit, and add to the cuteness. I found the lace pattern through Ravelry, it's from Janine. I thought the story of the lace was sweet, so I'd like to share it with you. Here how Janine describes the pattern on Ravelry:

"I was recently going through my late Mom’s craft things when I found this knitting pattern.

It is the pattern my Grandmother used to make lace. She was a simple country woman. A farmer’s wife and mother of four children.

I can remember her making quilts and knitting lace.

She used this simple lace to edge all of her pillowcases.

I am not a knitter but I wanted Grandma’s lace to live on so I decided to share the pattern. "

The pattern is easy, and gives a simple but cute lace. It's worked from one end, so you can make it as long as you wish. Thanks for sharing, Janine! I added a crocheted cord of chain stitches to the lace in this tunic.

Easter gnomy for sale!

I kept picturing my scrap gnomy in warm yellow, orange and red colours, so I had to dive into my stash and give it a try. I must admit I'm quite happy with the result:

Mods: Didn’t want to knit with needles 2 mm, so I cast on 110 for the hem, and increased after the folding. Changed the first stars a little bit, to reduce three colour stranding from 4 to 2 rounds.

Yarn: Fingering yarn from stash.

Size: Child (hat circumfrence 45 cm)

The hat was made for fun, and so far doesn't have an owner. It's up for sale , to raise money for a football ground for the kids in the neighbourhood. (It's a Norwegian site, but payment can be arranged via paypal if other people are interested.)