Born to knit

Hjördis Goes to Örebro

I´m knitting a new hat called Hjördis.

It´s to go with a pair of mittens, also called Hjördis – that I made last year.

Hjördis has a very simple pattern so it´s ideal to take along if you need to go on a train ride to Örebro, for instance, and need a knittin to accompany you.

The black yarn is Cherry Tree Hill (as usual) and the multicoloured yarn is Louet Gems in Peacock.

I checked that the medieval castle, Örebro slott, was still there. It was.

A few years ago I interviewed the mayor of Örebro. 

She was resident in the castle and convinced that it was haunted. 

In the middle of the night she could hear sounds of furniture being moved on the floor above her apartment. But when she went upstairs to look who was making all the noise there was noone there...

After the train journey back from Örebro Hjördis was almost completed and looked like this:

I´m not a hundred percent happy with that, so I´m going to rip the top part and make a few small changes. 

The edge is curling slightly and I´m not sure that  I dare to press it with an iron. 

Not after what happened to the other hat, that became too big after pressing.

The pattern comes from the underside of a sleeve, belonging to an old sweater from Hälsingland.

But I thought it was too lovely to be hidden away on the underside.

It´s what I like best – taking something old and traditional and using it in a new piece of knitting.

Swedish traditional knitting needs a little bit of tender, loving care – don´t you think?

It has been neglected for too long.

I did also cast on for those lovely Serpentine socks from Wendy´s new book.

Here´s the first one. It was a quick knit – and lots of fun, too.

The yarn is Artyarn dk weight and wonderfully soft. It was a present from my friend L-B.

Much appreciated, L-B!

And now you have to excuse me, I need to cast on for the second sock.

It can´t possibly wait any longer.

I Surrender!

Look what the Easter bunny brought:

My friend Wendy´s new book! Socks from the Toe Up.

Today is the publishing day, but I received my copy a bit before, so I´ve had time to read it.

 And believe me, this is the Bible of Socks. It covers everything from the toe and up.

It has simple socks and simply lovely socks.

My copy now falls open by itself on this page:

Pink hearts. Me like.

Husband of course took to a pair of plain, but beautiful white socks and started making hints about how he needs a new pair. 

And I honestly think he would be able to knit them himself after reading the thorough instructions and looking at all the illustrations. Heh!

There was a dedication on the first page from the author herself.

I´m not sure if that is a threat or a prediction, but I prefer to believe that Wendy is something of a psychic medium. Or how could she otherwise know about these?

The children will soon start feeling ashamed of me...

In my stash I have some lovely DK sock yarn that my friend LB gave to me some time ago.

Choosing a pattern was hard, but trying to avoid being predictable I finally picked this one.

See, it´s not the pink pattern!

But don´t you agree that they might look very good made in a pale pink and purple yarn?

And since the wretched hat is done and the size now close to perfect, I´m free to start something new.

Elise is still busy felting small furry animals.

This is probably a little mouse.

Bigheaded

There were so many nice comments about the Swedish Selbu hat, both here and on Ravelry that I´m afraid that my ego became rather over-inflated.

But don´t worry. Something happpened that deflated it good and proper.

See this here:

I had to re-knit the top no less than seven times – I´m not easily pleased.

But I finally managed to figure out how to do the decreases without ruining the pattern.

It was a perfect fit. 

I just thought I would press it very carefully with an iron to fix that slightly uneven bottom edge.

And it totally ruined it. The hat became so big that it covered my eyes and rested on my nose.

No, I did NOT take a photo. I was too hopping mad.

There was nothing to be done, except for frogging the whole thing.

So I did.

I washed the yarn and hung it to dry.

Instead I cast on a mitten, using my favourite Cherry Tree Hill yarn in a new "Potluck" colourway.

The mitten is a slightly re-worked version of a pattern I came up with last year called Inga Snöflinga.

It did look suspiciously big, but I did my best to ignore that inner voice trying to warn me...

But when I tried it on there was no denying it – it was miles too big.

Bye, bye.

Now I´m back to working on the New! Improved! Swedish Selbu hat.

The amazing thing is that the yarn looks as good as new.

It must be very resilient. 

But I´ve not only moped about at home after frogging my knitting this last week.

I did make it to Syfestivalen (Stockholm Knitting and Stitching Show) with Cina.

She came all the way from Sundsvall and it was great to see her again.

I didn´t buy much yarn, but a big bag of roving for Elise. She loves making small felted animals.

I asked her to make a little chicken, but she said that the beak was too hard.

Instead she made a little dog.

Happy Easter!