New pattern: Lullaby love

I fell in love with the Rainbow Kauni yarn in a small yarn shop in Copenhagen. I had no idea what to make, but I just had to buy a couple of rainbow skeins. I soon realised that this yarn would be perfect for a baby blanket (at least esthetically, maybe not practically..it’s handwash only). I've seen some shawls made of this yarn, that's a bit too much, even for me..

I finished the blanket last autumn, but I haven't showed it till recently, because I was trying to get the pattern published. I first submitted it to The Inside Loop, who published my first patterns, Hippocampus and Amiga. But sadly, the magazine had to close down this spring, as I told you before. Then I tried Knitty, but was again nicely rejected. Amy suggested I submit the pattern to Petite Purls, "a magazine that specializes in baby and children's knitting patterns". And so I did, but no... So here is the pattern - self published - for sale ($ 7). Hope you like it. More photos on Flickr.

SKILLS NEEDED
Basic knitting skills
Stranded colourwork
Steeking
Fabric lining and binding

MATERIALS

MC Kauni Effektgarn wool; 438 yd/ 401 m per 100g skein; color: Rainbow;
(The Kauni skeins come in different sizes. I used just over one 160 g skein.)

CC Rauma Finullgarn wool; 360 yd /330 m per 100g skein; color: white; I used appr 125 g (Rauma Finullgarn is a Norwegian fingering wool yarn.
You can use any other fingering wool, f. ex a solid coloured Kauni.)

1 24-inch US #2,5/3mm circular needle
1 24-inch US #4 /3,5mm circular needle
Fabric for lining.

Time for wool...

...we had the first snow today!

RUNNER UP! 1000 Fabulous Knit Hat Book

Remember I told you I had sent photos of some of my hats to Annie Modesitt's book project 1000 faboulous hats? I thought I could have a chance of beeing one of thousand by submitting photos of six hats, but it turns out I'm one of the seven runner up hats, and my pattern will be published in the book!! You can see the hats here. Isn't it amazing?!? Can't wait to see the book.

(Some of you, like me, might not be familiar with the expression "Runner-up". Here's what Wikipedia says: "Runner-up is a term used to denote a participant which finishes in second place in any of a variety of competitive endeavors, most notably sporting events and beauty pageants; in the latter instance, the term is applied to more than one of the highest-ranked non-winning contestants, the second-place finisher being designated "first runner-up," the third-place finisher "second runner-up," and so on.")

The pattern is for sale, $ 6. (Until the new football field is a reality, the money goes to this project.)

Knitting in colour - o r a n g e -

Judith (Norwegian blog) has invited her fellow knitting bloggers to show their work in colour - and first is orange. She herself has some beautiful photos in her post. Orange is one of my favourite colours - and I thought, no problem, I must have lots of orange projects. But no, I could only find two (not counting the huge orange mohair sweater I made in the eighties, which I (un)fortunately don't have a photo of..)

The "Hup Holland" hat is of course orange:

And then the Wintergreen mittens, made in white and the orange part of Kauni effektgarn rainbow.

White and orange is a nice colour combo I think - have a look at these socks. I definitely must use more orange!!

10000 kroner for football fields

Today I reached ten thousand Norwegian kroner for football fields! Thanks to everyone who has bought a hat or a pattern! But the new football ground is not yet here, so patterns are still for sale (see right sidebar), and I might even make another hat or two.

Hawaiian flower tunic

I fell in love with these flowers when I found them on Flickr. Later, I saw them on Ravelry, and found a link to the free pattern. I sighed when I saw "Pattern is written in Australian terminology" - so, I would have to struggle through a third crochet terminology... But it turns out, British and Australian terminology are the same, at least for the stitches used in this pattern.

Tunic tutorial

You need: Twelve flower motifs joined like this. My motifs measure 8,5 cm, inner square 17 cm, outer square 34 cm.

A big t-shirt

Cut t-shirt like this

Cut sleeves like this

Sew together like this.

Add flowers

(Note about the flower motif pattern from Ravelry: "This pattern was originally in a single post, but when the designer’s blog was migrated she re-posted it round by round as a mystery motif. The pattern starts in the post titled “rings” on the linked page. You will then need to view the posts for each additional round, navigating to another archive page for several.")

Libelula Piper

I knew I had the right button when I saw the Piper hat in Twist Collective Autumn 2009 .I first saw these buttons in an Art and Craft Fair in Oslo last August. Later, I saw that the museum shop at Maihaugen had started to sell these buttons, and that's where I bought this pretty dragonfly button. I tried to find a link to the museum shop, but couldn't find one. (You have a job to do, Tove! Here is a photo from the museum pharmacy.) You can see more buttons at Snella og Petronella. And here is my hat:

I used Garnstudio DROPS Silke Alpaca. It's very soft and nice, but lacks a little bit in elasticity. But I think I'll be happy with the hat. It's a great pattern, well written, and easy to follow. You can read about the design process on the designer Christa Giles' blog here.

I started out with the larger size, but I realised it would become to big. I'm so used to stranded colourwork, so I forget that stockinette stitch is much more elastic. So I omitted the last increase round, and it turned out ok for my 56 cm head (22 inches).