Mio my Mio

A collegue of mine has just had her second child. A girl this time. She asked me if I could make her a baby quilt. I'm always happy for an excuse to make something, but I warned her. I was going to make it sweet and pink this time. As you might have guessed, pink and sweet is not her thing. So to tease her, I made a pink knitted lace, with a white quilted silk carpet below. Could it be sweeter?

 A little worried about what she was going to say, I chose as a motive for the knitted lace a tableau from one of my favourite books as a child, "Mio my Mio" by Astrid Lindgren. This book has many dimensions, but the story I wanted the little girl to carry with her trough life, is to have the courage to stand up to people who want to control you.

Mio is actually named Bosse, and lives in Stockholm. He has only one friend in life and is bullied regularly by the other children. One night, a genie comes to him while he sits on a park bench crying. The genie tells him that he is really a prince in the land Far away and takes him home to his father, the King, who calls him Mio.

Mio finally experiences what it means to be loved, and he gets many friends. But he also discovers that there comes responsibility with being a prince. In the land Beyond, the evil Knight Kato rules with an iron fist. He captures disobedient children and turns them into birds who are doomed to circle his castle for all eternity.

Mio, which is a scared and shy little boy, realizes that he is the only one who can save these children. He finds the courage to ride out with his best friend Jumjum, to challenge the evil Knight Kato. Because of his kindness to people he meets along the way, he gets the help he needs to defeat the knight and free the children. The motive for this blanket is when Mio challenges Kato and wins.

At the centre of this blanket, I have knitted a pattern called "The Ginger bread castle". I can not remember if this happens in the book, but I chose to put the knight's castle on fire. The flames are a pattern called "Bleeding harts", while the cliffs below the castle is a pattern called "Purl shell pattern". Around the castle birds are flying, which is a pattern called "Shower head". All these patterns you may find in Barbara G. Walker's book series "A Treasury of Knitting Patterns". The blanket is knitted in a beautiful silk and alpaca yarn from Du store alpaca, named Fin, in a deep pink colour (229).

Many of us meet people who are trying to get us to do things we really do not want to do. It takes great courage to stand up to such pressure, to be who you are.

To the little girl who has just been born, I wish you all the best in life and that you may find happiness. I also hope that you will find the courage to stand up to your Knight Kato. Be who you want to be. Think for yourself. Make your own choices. 

"Mio my Mio".

Glamour for my daughter

My daughter Elise was a little grumpy because I have knitted many shawl, but none for her. It was cold, and she had no scarves that she thought looked nice. So I went to the store and found a yarn that looked like it ought to be a scarf for my daughter.

The yarn is called Kid Silk Haze Glamour from Rowan, and is a silk and mohair combination with sequins. The sequins are attached to the yarn with a nylon thread. Fortunately, this tread is not very visible because the yarn is relatively fluffy. I also found her favorite color (called Trance 284), so she was very happy when I got home and showed her yarn. She wanted a simple scarf, so I made a version "Thousands of blue anemones".

As of now, she has not used the scarf yet. She may think that it's too fancy to use at school. It doesn't really matter because in seven months time there will be another winter.

A caged songbird

When I was at university, I was looking after a canary while its owners lived abroad. They thought it was a female, because it didn’t sing. When the bird had gotten used to me and its surroundings, I opened the door to the cage and let it fly freely inside my student lodgings. It was not a large room, but I thought it was better than sitting inside the cage all day.

Then a miracle happened. During the next few weeks his eyes became sparkling and the feathers became brighter and more intensely coloured. But the most amazing thing was that he started to sing. Every day when I came home from university, he flew out of his cage, sat on the highest point of the cage and sang for me. It always started with some beautiful trills, sliding into a series of long melancholic tones. His song was very sad and amazingly beautiful (not unlike these samples; one and two, but a bit more melancholic). He kept on singing for half an hour before finishing, always in the same way, and then flying back into his cage again.

I fell completely in love with this bird, and it was with a heavy heart that I gave him up when the owners returned. I knew they were not going to let him out, and that he would become pale and quiet again. It still hurts to think that he ended his days locked inside his cage.

Currently, I have to make do with the birds outside. Wild birds are very interesting. They are not used to being seen, so when you make them aware that you see them, they get confused. Some get frightened and fly away, while others are curious and want contact. When I was working in my garden last spring, I got in contact with a small red robin. He jumped around me, flew away with some nesting material, came back again, sat in some bushes close by and sang for me. Observing me from a safe distance. I met him several times that spring, and every time he jumped around me and sang a bit.

I love birds and I wanted to make a tribute to them. It was very difficult to find patterns that resembled birds, but I found two: one looking like birds flying in a flock and one that looks like a beautiful caged bird spreading its wings.  I chose to place the songbird trapped inside a frame in the centre of the scarf, while the wild birds fly past outside. Fri.

The pattern of the wild birds flying in a flock is actually called "Shower head", and is a pattern that I founde in  Barara G. Walker's book series "A Treasury of Knitting Patterns". The pattern of the songbird is a butterfly pattern that I found in Siri Reimann's book "The Haapsalu Shawl". I found the pattern for the boorder on the edges in Nancy Bush's book "Knitted Laces of Estonia". 

I have knitted the scarf in a thin and hairy alpaca yarn called "Air" from Du store alpaca, in a deep purple colour (no. 110). I made this scarf to wear with a filted black and purple coat of mine (see the pictures).

I have made this scarf for all caged songbirds, in hope that theyat least ones in their life may experience how it is to be free. As the bird.

The Faun's veil

One late summers day when I was four, my mother took me and my two older siblings into the forest to pick blueberries. At one point, my mother warned us about a beehive. But I could not see any hive. I just saw trees and heather. It was as if someone had drawn a veil before my eyes. As if I could not focus. I saw absolutely no hive.

It went as it had to: Both my siblings walked around the hive, while I, who saw nothing, went straight on. I just stumbled over the beehive. When the others asked why, all I could reply was "I didn't see it." The next thing I remember is sitting in the kitchen taking off my T-shirt. I was covered in beestings. Every time I think of this memory, I still smell the vinager my mom used to make the stings less painful.

In the movie "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe", the little girl Lucy meets the faun Tumnus under the lamp post which marks the outer border of Narnia. He takes her home for afternoon tea, where he plays his flute for her so that she falls into a trance and do not discover that something is wrong. Tumnus actually plan to hand Lucy over to the White Witch, but luckily for Lucy, Tumnus feels guilty and fails to complete his plan.

When I saw the film for the first time, the story about the faun Tumnus made me think of the blueberry trip that ended so dissasterous. It was as if a faun had played his flute for me, so all I could see was trees and blueberry heather. Unluckily for me, my faun had no qualms throwing dust in my eyes, unlike Mr. Tumnus, who failed to betray Lucy in the end.

The pattern in the center of this shawl is called The Faun's eye, and looks like the head of a faun. This is a pattern I found in Barara G. Walker's book series "A Treasury of Knitting Patterns". On the inner border, I have used a pattern of blueberry heather, with nobs for berries, which I have composed myself.

The outer border is also partially self-composed. It consists of two patterns; leaves on a sling and three berries in a pile. The outermost pattern is a modification of a pattern I found in Sharron Miller book "Heirloom Knitting". The leaf pattern in the inner loop of the outer border is self-composed, inspired by a sweater I saw in a newspaper.

At first glance, it looks like this shawl is covered by blueberry heather. But if you look closely, the eyes of the faun emerges. When you have seen the eyes, you discover that there are many of them. The whole center is covered with fauns.

Now, as an adult, I know that the reason I did not see the hive was that I was simply too short to see it over the vegetation. However, at the time, it seemed almost magical. It is funny how we try to find an explanation when we observe something we do not understand.

Star light in a bleak night

 One autumn day when I was five, me and my sister (who was eleven at the time) got lost in the woods. We had been hiking with our brother, but wanted to go home before him. That was the day I learned that my sister does not have any sense of direction what so ever. We were not far from home, and the trip should only take about fifteen minutes, but it was not long before we became completely lost. We went in the opposite direction of what we were supposed to: so instead of going towards our house, we went straight into the deepest parts of the forest.

We walked and walked for hours, and the night became pitch-black, both because we were in the woods and because it was raining. I became very frightened and began to cry. After many hours, we came to a clearing in the woods. I looked up at the sky. The clouds had lifted and the sky was covered with stars. It was a beautiful sight.

When we came to the clearing, we also spotted the out door lights of some houses nearby. We went towards the light, and discovered that we had been going in a big circle, and had ended up not far from our house. When we came home, it was over nine o'clock in the evening. Embarrassed, but very happy, I went to bed that night.

I really wanted to make a shawl of the starry night sky through the foliage, as I remembered it from that night in the woods. In the center of this shawl, I used a pattern called "Star Light". The pattern looks simple enough, but is one of the most challenging patterns I've ever knitted. For the inner border, I used a simple leaf pattern, which I have modified slightly so that it will fit with the increases in the corners. I have also added rain drops on the leaves. The outer border is a variation of the wet leaf pattern, which I composed myself. 

I have knitted the shawl in a thin and hairy alpaca yarn called Air from Du store alpaca. It is knitted in a dark steel gray colour (no. 111) which is very bleak, as that night in the woods. I wanted to make a big, thick but light shawl, which cover everything and make it dark, but where you could just make out what lies behind.

That night in the woods gave me an experience that defined me. Now, I always make sure I know where I am and where I'm going, and I do not take for granted that others (espesially my sister) know. But it also made me an optimist: If I don't give up, new opportunities will always emerge, even if everything seems very bleak and without any hope.

A rose garden

Throughout my childhood, our garden was filled with roses. We even had a huge Rosehip hedge that smelled lovely, and which gave sweet hips during the fall. Apart from that, it was a pain in the neck. Every time you tried to pick a rose or a hip, your fingers would be pierced by thousens of small and very sharp thorns.

Within the Shetland tradition of knitting lace shawl, ring shawls are the finest and thinnest. They are worked in a very fine yarn, and it is possible to thread the shawl through a wedding ring. These shawls have large and elaborate patterns, and was used for bridal shawl in the old days. There is a lot of work involved in knitting these shawls, and I've only made one such shawl before. I really wanted to make a ring shawl with lots of roses on it.

This shawl is built in the traditional Shetland manner; with a centre, an inner and an outer border. I have used a classic Shetland pattern called "The rose lace" in the centre of the shawl. For the inner border, I have used two versions of the same pattern: in the innermost part of the border, the pattern is knitted on every row, while in the outermost part the same pattern knitted with a row of plain knitting inbetween. The latter gives more body and texture to the pattern, while the first (where you knit pattern on each row) gives a very elegant and airy pattern.

I have partly composed the pattern in the inner border myself. I planned to use a classic Shetland pattern called "Mrs Montague's pattern - as a fine lace," which I found in the Sharron Miller's book "Heireloom knitting". The problem was that the pattern chart in the book was incorrect and did not fit the picture of the pattern. This error also made the pattern internally inconsistent. I had two options: either to go back to the pattern in the picture or to make the same mistake twice so that the pattern became internally consistant. I chose to do the last because, if you look closely, this pattern looks like an inverted rose. For the outer border, I used a pattern that Sharron Miller had constructed on the basis of "The rose lase".

For this shawl, I used a very thin cotton yarn called Gossamer Cotton, which I bought from Sharron Miller's web-store called "Heireloom knitting". This yarn is incredibly light and thin, and runs 1000 m on a 25 g skein. I used just one skein for this shawl. I thought the shawl would turn out light and nice with such an incredably thin yarn, but in hindsight I'm not sure.

Because of the thin yarn and the delicate pattern, this was such an impossably demanding shawl to knit, and I simply could not be bothered to make it as big as I really wanted. And it is so light that the it does not really fall nicely, but rather curls up. Neither does it tolerate moisture without losing its shape (something that happened when I took these pictures). In hindsight, I wished I had knitted the shawl in a slightly thicker and and more heavy yarn.

We sold the house and the new owners removed the Rosehip hedge. I miss it some times, and whenever I think back on my childhood, it's always there. But I must admit that when I moved into my current resedence, I removed the Rosehip bushes that were there. They are incredibly beautiful and smells sweet, but completely unapproachable and impossible to live with.

The thistle shawl

Throughout my childhood, we used to go for long walks on Sundays, as most respectable families in the 70's. My favorite places to go hiking was a large rock with 3000 year old rock carvings at Penne, "Bøensbakken" at the end of a narrow fjord called Framvaren, and on one of the many Lista beaches. The beaches are especially beautiful during the winter, when you can walk on the sand without falling down and without getting sand in your shoes.

In the ditchs in the fields along the beaches grew thistles. They are really quite beautiful, with thick and spiky silver leaves and stems and with a lovely purple flower. When the flowers of thistles wither, they become burdocks, which get stuck everywhere. I especially remember one Sunday when my brother and I had a burdock fight. I do not remember the fight, but I remember very well how much harder it is to get the burdocks out of long than short hair.

Yet, I have always liked thistles. The plant may not be particularly welcoming, but the flowers are beautiful. And it's fascinating how well the burdocks adheres to almost any surface.

An Estonian pattern, which goes by the name of "The most beautiful lace pattern in the world" gives me associations to thistle flowers. I've used this pattern before, including in the center of "The Most Beautiful" Shawl in the world". You can find this pattern in Siri Reimann's book "The Haapsalu Shawl". In this shawl, "the most beautiful lace pattern in the world" is used on the outher border of the center. In the the middle of the center, I used a pattern called "Thistle Leaf Pattern", which I found in Barara G. Walker's book series "A Treasury of Knitting Patterns ".

In the rest of the center, between the leaf and the flowers, I used a classic Shetland lace patterns you may find in Sharron Miller's book "Heirloom Knitting", where the pattern is called "Small leaf". I've used this pattern in several shawls, and it gives a very airy lace, like a sea breeze. I have composed the pattern on the outher boarder myself around the flower of the thistle in a modified version of the "World's Most Beautiful lace pattern".

I have knitted the shawl in a very thin merino wool yarn called "Fine Merino". This lace shawl is almost invisible, like the smells of salty air. The problem with this yarn is, however, that it is so thin and lightweight that the shawl does not really falls as nicely as I had hoped. It was also a bit damp in the air when I took the picture, which led to the shawl loosing shape and elasticity.

In hindsight, I should perhaps have chosen a slightly heavier yarn to knit this shawl. I was, however, happy with the composition of the shawl. It is a bright, light and airy shawl, like a happy childhood memory of a Sunday stroll on the beach.

The most beautiful shawl in the world

The pattern used in this shawl became very famous in America, and is known as "the world's most beautiful lace pattern". Hundreds of shawls with this pattern were ordered from Haapsalu in Estonia to the United States. Personally, I think the pattern looks like the flower of a thistle. This is a very beautiful pattern and it's easy to see why it became so popular in the U.S..

This shawl is made up of a centre with the pattern known as the most beautiful in the world and an outer border. "The world's most beautiful lace pattern" can eg. be found in Siiri Reimanns book "The Haapsalu Shawl". I have chosen a classic Estonian rounded border as the pattern for the outer border. This pattern can be found in Nancy Bush's book "Knitted Laces of Estonia.

For this shawl, I have chosen a mixed silk and mohair yarn, called Alchemy of Haiku in a beige colour called 124m - Husk. If you do not have  much training knitting laces, this type of yarn can be a bit challenging, and it may be an idea to switch to a smooth and slightly more elastic wool yarn. It will probably bring forth the pattern a little better as well. However, laces knitted in such a thin and fluffy yarn becomes very beautiful, and the shawls are very warm, light and airy at the same time.

The world's most beautiful pattern requires some practise to knit, as the number of stitches changes across rounds. However, if you follow the pattern, the structure in the pattern will suddenly appear. After that, it's not as difficult to knit as it looked at first glance. If you have some experience in lace knitting, or is sufficiently motivated, it should be okay to knit this shawl. However, it might be an idea to knit a sample patch first, so you get the intuition of the pattern before starting on the actual shawl.