To dream under water

We have a summer home in the skerries of the Oslo fjord. It is very small, only 37 m2, but has many smart solutions. This makes it possible for us to live there for longer periods of a time. One of the smart solutions is a box bed behind a curtain in the hallway. The curtain was a bit dreary, so I wanted to quilt a nice drape in front of the alcove.

The theme for the drape was “An under water dream”. It is made of a large piece of backing fabric, and measures 210x190cm. It has applications of fishes, sea turtles, mussels, starfishes, corals, kelp and seaweeds. The aim was to make it dark enough to sleep behind the drape.

I have had the pleasure to snorkel with sea turtles twice in my life, and it is a magnificent experience. The last time I snorkelled with turtles, I was with my daughter, who were to sleep in the bed box. Thus, I wanted sea turtles on the drape. I found a nice pattern for the application of the sea turtles and sea weed, named "Follow me", designed by Carol. The pattern for the corals and the yellow and black fishes, is "Dolphin Bay" from Cornelia W. Carpenter.

Additionally, I found some pictures of various fish on the net, and made my own patterns (see pictures below). I particularly enjoyed making the clown fishes.

I also loved to make the turtles. In the original pattern, the turtle in front was looking behind to the other turtles, as to urge them to follow him. I wanted the turtle in front to look at the fishes in the foreground, to focus the attention on the minor details on the curtain (see pictures below).

The drape hangs in a narrow corridor, which makes it difficult to make an overview picture. I have tried, and if you see the two pictures below in relation, it gives an idea of how the curtain is put together.

 

The drape works as a charm, and nobody can see that there is a box bed behind it. Additionally, it gives a lot of colour and atmosphere to our summer home.

Mini-Iulie

This is Mini-Iulie. She loves the nature, and likes to go on long trips cross country skiing or hiking in the mountains. She is very concerned with issues of bio-diversity, and tries to make people be precautionary with gene modified produce. Here, she is evaluating bio-diversity in a gene modified corn field. She likes to dress in colourful cloths, and her favourite colour is sea green.

Mini-Iulie is a modification of Beth Webber’s doll "Mini Free Spirit", which you can find the pattern for on her blog "By hook by hand". The hair is made by crocheting some big curles in Faerytail from Du store alpakka, covered by some angle hair I found in my local crafts store.

Her shawl is made by a thin quilting thread in Egyptian cotton, called King Tut. Her cloths are crochet in a no. 10 crochet yarn called Sissy 10.

You can find the pattern for the butterflies in the book "100 Flowers to Knit and Crochet". Her eyes is bought in the net shop Suncatcher eyes.

 

This doll is to be given to a colleague of mine called Iulie, on her 55 birthday (see the picture on the left). I hope they will enjoy each others company.

Mini-Cathrine

This is Mini-Cathrine. She is an active person. Her favourite hobby is to kite, both on snow and on water. Today, she is kiting on water. Even though she is no longer a youth, she still chooses to spend most of her spare time kiting with (mainly) young fit men in their early twenties, much to the other Mini-Me’s astonishment.

The water is made by the Catharine wheel stitch (see here for an instructional video of how to crochet this stitch ). This stitch makes an uneven surface which reminds me of small waves. Her hair is made by a flossy yarn, in the same fashion as Mini-Annegrete. Her eyes is bought in a net shop called Suncatcher eyes.

Her kite is crochet in two layers, with padding in between and pipecleaners along the edges. This makes it possible to form the kite in an arc, which gives the illusion that it is filled with air and blowing in the wind. The kite board is padded with quilting padding, and sewn onto the water with a doll stand inside.

Mini-Cathrine is, as my other Mini-Me dolls, a modified version of Beth Webber’s doll "Mini Free Spirit". You can find this, and many other beautiful doll patterns, on her blog "By hook by hand". Mini-Cathrine is to be given to a colleague of mine (see picture on the right) on her 48^th birthday right before easter.

Irish Crochet

One time I was browsing my favorite blogs, I saw a link to some Irish crochet works. They were so beautiful, I just had to try. I started roaming the net for patterns and yarn. It was actually quit difficult. I found some patterns, but they were all named Irish crochet. So when they arrived, I ended up buying two of the pattern in three different formats. One electronically (see here for a link), one as separate booklets (I do not remember where I found them), and one book including both booklets (see here for a link).

These two booklets were, however, absolutely beautiful, and the patterns was in a league of their own compared to the other patterns I bought (all pictures are based on patterns in the first booklet). This is a good book both for beginners and more advanced crocheters. The instructions are relatively easy to follow and the pictures are informative and beautiful. However, be aware that the notation is somewhat unusual. For instance, in the patterns a single crochet is called a double crochet, and a double crochet is called a treble crochet, and so on. Thus, it is good advice to read the pages describing the stitches before beginning, even for more advanced crocheters.

I also had difficulties finding fine enough yarn. The pattern called for yarn size 100 (which is as thin as sewing tread), but the finest yarn I could find in my local shop was a size 10. I tried to find fine enough yarn on the internet, but yarn size 40 and onwards had to be ordered specially. They only had size 30 and thicker in stock, and size 30 came only in white. The thinnest yarn available in colors was size 20. (A good net shop for purchasing fine crochet yarns is Royal Yarns.)

Since I had trouble finding such thin yarn in colors, I decided to practice using yarn size 10, and then try to crochet using my cotton quilting thread. The white flowers are crocheted using yarn size 10, and the colored flowers are crochet using quilting thread and a 0.6 mm needle. The difference in size between using yarn size 10 and quilting tread can be seen from the picture to the right, where the orange flower is crocheted using Yli Yli quilting tread.

I will use the motifs crocheted using quilting tread to decorate a folder to store my crochet needles in. The white motifs will be used to decorate a bag for my ongoing crochet projects. They are not finished yet. To make a complete Irish crochet, the motifs need to be joined together with a mesh of loops, into the desired shape. For illustrations of this joining of motifs, see here and here. If this is a success, I will make a Irish crochet dress for my daughter.

The crown prince shawl

This shawl was given to crown prince Gustav-Adolf of Sweden when he visited Estonia in 1936. The pattern is a copy of a picture of the shawl, designed and knitted by Mrs. Valdeman. This is a lovely shawl, with a simple but beautiful checker pattern in the middle, and some large stars along the inner border. I found the pattern in Nancy Bushe’s book "Knitted Laces of Estonia", which I absolutely love.

The shawl is knitted in a fine merino wool yarn, called "Fine Merino", which I found in an American web shop called "Purl Soho".

The shawl is 95x95 cm and weighs 42 g. In retrospect, I think the shawl would have looked nicer if I had used a thicker yarn. Both because it would have been larger, fallen more heavily, and the nubs would had looked better. These ultra thin yarns is best suited for patterns without nubs.

The shawl has been finished almost a year now. It has been lying on my corner table, waiting for me to block it out. When I finally decided to do the blocking, I got a shock. There had been a little mouse gnawing two holes in my shawl. Luckily, I was able to mend the holes, so that they do not run. If you look closely, it is possible to spot the mending, but my hope is that if I do not tell anyone, they will not notice.

Peter Rabbit

Finally, I have finished Peter Rabbit. I started on him more than one year ago, but he as been laying half-finished for a while now. But, as my bunad project is almost finished, I took the opportunity to complete various projects, including Peter.

He is my absolute favourite in the book "Le Monde de Beatrix Potter". This book is filled by fantastic cross stitch embroideries of Beatrix Potter’s pictures. I have made several mice already, among them a tailor mouse and many small kitchen mice, who I embroidered for a valance in the kitchen window at our cabin.

I do not know what I want to make of Peter yet. He will probably decorate a quilted bag of some sort.

Mini-Mona

Meet Mini-Mona. She loves to be surrounded by nature. In particular, she enjoy nature in a sun lounger on the terrace, in the garden. There she is enjoying the spring sun, preferably with a glass of red wine and with a good book. She really knows how to enjoy herself.

She is to be given to Mona, a colleague of mine, who turns 50 in April. Mona is the initiator of most social events at my work, with a very nice and cheerful personality. They have much in common, and I believe they will enjoy each others company. Mona also enjoys sunshine, and now she can do this in the company of Mini-Mona.

Mini-Mona is a midification of Beth Webber’s doll, Mini Free Spirit. If you have not visited her blog yet, By hock by hand, you should. She makes some incredibly sweet crocheted dolls, and she shares all her patterns free on her blog, including patterns for cloths and pets.

Mini-Monas hair is made of a thin alpaca yarn from Du store Alpakka, which is called Tynn Alpakka. Her terrace is made of a local Norwegian yarn called Østlandsgarn. The grass is made by a flossy yarn named On Line Linie 9 Multidream, and the cloths and flowers are made by various leftovers from old projects, which I do not know the name of.

I found the patterns for the flowers and the butterfly in two wonderful books. The butterfly and the small flowers in the grass is found in the book "100 Flowers to Knit & Crochet" and the big blue flower is from the book "Chrochet Bouquet".

I tried to make Mini-Mona resemble the original (see picture to the right). The thought is that birds of a feather flock together.

A birthday card in cross stitches

Last year, I made a little amigurami as a birthday card for each of the girls in my daughters class (see here for the link to last years birthday cards). This year, I wanted to sew something for them. So I looked through my cross stitch recipes, and found a book with some small fairies forming letters (see here for a link to the book). I decided to make a small pin cushion with the initial capital for each of the girls.

 







I have embroidered all of the letters, and made most of the pin cushions (see various pictures). The A stands for Ane, B for Bethine, E for Elida, Emilie and Elise, H for Hanne, I I for Ingrid Irene, M for Mia, S for Synne and T for Thelma. Two of the cushions are already given away, and the last one is given away in December.

 

 







I hope the girls like the cushions, and maybe I have inspired them to make some things themselves.

 

The beginning of the end

I have not been making as much as I normally do this fall. Not because I have not been working, but because my bunad project has taken so much of my time. Finally, however, I am beginning to see the beginning of the end for this project.

I have finished the bunad and the purse (se pictures). I had also finished the shirt, but when I tried it on, it was too small. They had cut the fabric too small at the store, and they had to cut it again for me. But now that I know how to make it, it will only take me about one week to finish when the new fabric arrives.

The only thing which is left to do now is the jacket. The problem is that the instructions of how to put the jacket together do not exist yet.

To make things even harder, the store does not have a jacket on display exactly equal to mine. My hope is that the supervisor on the bunad course I am currently taking may be able to help me figure out how to assemble the jacket. I have five course evenings left, so I hope we will be able to figure it out. If all goes well, the entire bunad will be finished by the end of March.

And if all goes well, it had taken me seven months to finish the bunad. No matter what, I will probably have my new bunad ready for the Norwegian national hollyday at the 17th May.

My big alpaca love

I love to knit with alpaca yarn. It is very soft, warm and smooth. Here is a cardigan I knitted this Christmas. I found the pattern as “Pattern of the month” for July 2010 on the website of one of the biggest importers of alpaca yarn in Norway, called “Du store alpakka”. Only the sweater was given as the pattern of the month. Since I wanted a cardigan, I did some adjustments. The sweater is knitted in a yarn called “Tynn alpakka”. If you have not tried to knit in alpaca before, you should definitely try it. It is worth every penny. But since it is expensive, make sure you find a pattern you like.