Finally Surprised

First of all: thank you for all the nice comments lately! In early July I ordered a second hand Elizabeth Zimmerman book from Amazon - and a week later I could happily flicker through my very own copy of "Knitting workshop". The read was amusing - I actually ended up reading the book from cover to cover before casting on the Baby Surprise Jacket a few days later. This was a quick and fascinating knit that turned into a cute little jacket to fit a new born. The yarn is Fabel knit on 3 mm needles. The Heart Hat from the same book will soon be on the needles :o)

Sweet Sweater

So here it is; The Sweet Sweater! The plan was to follow Louise Hardings pattern called Hannah, but her pattern ended just as an inspiration. The gauge would not match and seeming the sleeves nicely would be a challenge because of my far from flexible yarn. I wanted to keep the ribbing and the pretty scooped neckline BUT make a cropped raglan. It was quite nervwrecking to finish the neckline to see if my own design idea would really work - and i think it did :o) Quite happy with this one - and I brought it AND the final scraps of yarn with me on holiday. The sweater to wear, the scraps to make a baby ripple. Stay tuned ;o)

Noro number

I guess most of you have forgotten this slow project long ago... it started as a successful long distance yarn shopping performed by a football tourist in London. Then my first attempt at actually making something from the colourful Noro Silk Garden led to this half done bag. I decided I would make another raglan cardie for my self, and started experimenting with different yarns to combine with the Noro. At some point I finally decided on a mix of alpaca and Carisma (100% superwash wool) after flattering encouragement from Supernøtt. The pattern was altered a bit - the upper arms felt a bit tight in the brown one, and this green yarn is less flexible - but I ended up having trouble with the proportions when I did the raglan decrease. It is a bit bulky on the under arm/shoulder-part, but I can live with that. The (happy) end.

Guten Tag

I feel so honoured when I recieve an award - this time from Supernøtt. Thank you! :o) I finally decided on five of my numerous favourites to recieve it from me. These could easily have been five hundred. Blogland is my land! And it makes me happy :o) iHanna href="http://annamariahorner.blogspot.com/">Anna Maria Horner Den gode feen Yarnstorm Hello my name is Heather

Cotton Candy Confusions & Confessions

This project has been providing equal parts og pleasure and pain so far... . The original idea was to make a sweater for my self, based on the "Hannah"-design by Louisa Harding (as shown above). I liked the shape, the neckline and the pretty "fake plait" ribbing, and the plan was simple: follow the pattern (except knitting in the round instead of back and forth) but make bold stripes instead of the Fair Isle. This way I could get use of my odd balls of cotton and viscose in a simple and almost mindless way. I thought I swatced and ended up with a perfect gauge according to the pattern and then knitted happily away. The yarns at hand made nice surfaces and interesting colour changes. I even spent some of my precious Debbie Bliss Pure Silk for the top of the waist ribbing. This was the pleasure part... Then, after trying the sweater on when I was almost ready for making the arm holes, I thougt the body looked a bit on the baggy side, but convinced myself it would fit properly as soon as I got it seamed up at the shoulders. I knitted on with a growing feeling of doubt. Half pleasure, half pain. Late one night I finished the neckband and finally tried the sweater on again. PAIN!!! Compare the original "Hannah" with my baggy, striped version, and you will know exactely what I mean. And it is a true mystery, as the gauge is still the same as the pattern asks for. Only one solution: Frog the *#§*¤ thing! More Pain!!! But I kept the ribbing, though... it is very flexible and snug because of the plait-construction. So here I go again: narrower stripes this time, and making the sweater a raglan (the seams of joined sleeves would not look neat done in this "hard" yarn lacking flexibility and bounce. I could see it after trying 5 or 6 different ways of seaming the shoulders. Also Pain!!!). I will keep the pretty neckline, though - mixing it with raglan sleeves will be an interesting challenge. Conclusion: this is not longer a Louisa Harding pattern. It is a totally modified pattern and so far it is yet again providing pleasure as I knit up to the joining of sleeves and almost finished the first cuff.

Girls Tank Top

This is a stashbuster! I have quite a lot of heavy cotton i n my stash but not a big love for it. But a tank top for a girl who is growing fast should be OK, as it doesn´t matter if the garments sags a bit. I still have at least 200 g left of the pink yarn - if I get bored through the summer I guess I can start mass producing of wash cloths... :o)

FBS 2

It is so great being back in business both RL knit wise and blog wise... and finally Ravelry-wise! I´ve been a member since October 15 2007, but my first real visit was yesterday... I have started working on my profile etc and you are of course welcome to see me in there as well. My name in Ravelry is fiberfeber. As you can see, another FBS has left my needles. This one was for a 80 year anniversary and I hope it was well recieved by the old lady :o)

Finally back in business!

There has been a bit of knitting, crocheting and sewing going on in RL the latest few months - but not much blogging. So let´s hope this will be the first in a long line of entries this summer. This little dress was made for the newborn cutie Amanda, and the size should fit size 4-6 months. Red yarn: Rowan Handknit Cotton in 215 Rosso. Pink yarn: super soft scrap of cotton from the stash! The pattern was bore "based on" than "altered", but originally found in the wonderful book called "myk start" (Soft start)

Yummy Yarn

This beauty is a hand spun and very precious x-mas gift from my super talented friend Supernøtt. I feel humble and overwhelmed by her skills and the beauty of the yarn to such an extent that I am unable to decide what to make from this treasure. So far I keep it in a miniature greenhouse where I admire it while hoping it will grow ;o) Thank you again for a wonderful gift, Supernøtt!

This is two skeins of Noro Blossom purchased in London before x-mas. It is the same two skeins in both pictures but obviously the light sources decides what hues the camera captures. I think the bottom one is closest to how I perceive the yarn. Even though this is also a truly beautiful and precious yarn, I think I have finally decided what I will use it for. This means there will soon be a vacant spot in my greenhouse/yarnhouse. Maybe my harvesting will encourage the Supernøtt-yarn to reproduce itself and fill the entire greenhouse??

Flower Basket

A pretty, soft cloud transformed into my first ever Flower Basket Shawl - thank you Supernøtt

for the pattern :o) A room with a view and a FBS! The blocking Detail of Flower Baskets before blocking

Rippling? Who? Me???

As you can see, the cosiness of The Oriental Garden Hexagon Blanket is endless - and inspiring! I still have quite a stash of yarn after finishing the hexagons. Like 14 balls of Merino baby´s wool... 4 of the pale yellow balls was a Secret Pal gift and the others are left overs from various projects. After a (too) quick estimation I decided that the wool would make up a blanket the size of a single bed. I even made a swatch to figure out exactely how many chain stitches this width required. Annoyingly sagacious, I know. But don´t worry, it didn´t help me much. The zigzags came out so pretty, and the rows were sooo lang... 360 double crochets to be exact. Which does not make a 90 cm (35,5 ") wide blanket. Oh no. It makes a 150 cm (59 ") wide blanket!!! Which in turn will requre WAY more wool than my baby´s Merino stash holds. Rip the ripple, you say? That is NOT an option. The solution is very simple: A stash busting project is turned into a stash adding project :oD New (and more accurate) calculations decided I will need a total of 31 balls of wool to finish a 150 x 200 cm blanket, suitable for the guest bed (120 cm wide). This means buying 17 more balls - but then again I will use the 14 I had in my stash too. So all in all, the Ripple Blanket will NOT add a single skein to the stash, and it will still reduce it by 14 balls ;o) The rippling started last Friday, and 7 days later about 25% of the blanket was done. Not bad! I don´t expect myself to keep up the pace, though... The pale yellow will work as a backgrund colour, but I soon decided that a variation in hues will be necessary to make it more interesting. I am a big fan of randomness in design - and I hope my blanket will turn out looking "scrappy random" even if it will consist less than 50% real scraps ;o)

Tougher than the rest!

The title of this post was not intended to describe myself, but as I actually recieved this award from Umulie, I guess it can apply for more than one subject ;o) Thank you very much, Umulie, I am honoured! Blogland is a wonderful land of opportunities and inspiration, fun and philosophy in so many different categories. I subscribe to 174 blog feeds at the moment, so I will have to leave out most of them when I forward the award... What is left is one single blog whose owner never fail to make my day, online or live :o)

Vridd Rett

Fairy Frida has got a big little pirate prince-brother, and of course he needed a cool hat too! The pattern is a mix of rib and stockinette panels. The hat is knitted partly in the round because og the single scull motif. Pattern: my own; scull more or less copied from "We call them Pirates". Yarn: 100% superwash wool. Needles: 3,5 mm

For Little Fairy Frida

Remember the "booties-for-Frida-and-a-hat-to-match"-post? Well, the little princess is still a tiny baby, but she has actually outgrown both the booties and the hat. The most perfect reason for knitting some more (slightly bigger though) cute garments! The pink yarn is Alpaca, the off white is Merino. I used 3 mm needles for the entire set, which created a very soft fabric very suitable for delicate baby skin

A new hat, garter stitch this time, a little scarf and a pair of socks - all for Little Fairy Frida to keep warm and comfortable Little pearly beads on the brim in a more or less random pattern Beads embellishing teh scarf as well

The long 2 x 2 rib can be worn like this, or be pulled up and hopefully keep the socks from fallig off

Medieval Cuff

First of all - thank you so much for the nice comments on the Hexagon Blanket! It is in daily use now, and even though I haven´t had the chance to wrap myself in an Oriental Garden yet, trustworthy sources keep telling me how nice it is. Sources being Princess, Darling and Dog... the latter refuses to keep off the blanket even though she is repeatedly told so, and I choose to take it as a proof of good crochet quality ;o)

This is a small project inspired by the aesthetics of the Medieval. The reason I even started it was that I am teaching a group of 1st year Design and Textiles college students. I wanted them to design an arm piece using decorative elements found in architechture and fashion in the middle ages. So I started a piece myself, just for fun - and to keep as an example for later students. I used thin coloured felt and coloured linen embroideri yarn. I started by cutting the pieces and pinned them together before I applied them to the background with tiny stitches (using a very thin needle and sawing thread to prevent the felt from fringing). The different embroidery stitches was then added. Finally I made a backing piece and the button loops + added two "emaralds" for buttons. The result was surprisingly nice - I think I am actually going to wear this one!

Grande finale - ta da!

The Oriental Garden in our Snowy Garden

Finally, in the VERY early hours of January 3rd the Hexagon Blanket was finished! A great relief in many ways - I haven´t dared started many new projects during the months I´ve been working on the hexagons as I was worried I would just lay the hexagons aside and loose the courage to go on. So I stayed faithful and it paid off! I still love the spicey colours and if I should name the blanket it would be Oriental Garden. A heavy load has now been lifted off my shoulders/lap and is now ready to weigh somebody else down (well, I won´t mind snuggeling up under this one myself!)- just check the weight in the statistics below... Project Hexagon started May 15th 2007, finished January 3rd 2008 The blanket measures 125 x 200 cm The total number of hexagons is 313 (Donald Ducks number plate is 313!!!) The total number of double (UK/treble (US) crochets is 56 340 Efficient work time (croheting, weaving in ends and sewing up the whole thing) spent on the project is 110 hours and 25 minutes + unknown amount of time spent sorting, counting and organizing the hexagons The blanket weighs 3,5 kg 3 150 g was taken from my stash/scraps 350 g of wool was bought to complete the blanket ...which means the Hexagon Blanket is a 90% stash reducing product, but this must not be confused with "has reduced my stash by 90%" - because THAT would make one stranglingly heavy blanket ;o)

A close up with snow shining through, revealing different coloured scraps of yarn used for joining the hexagons. This was done with simple stitches sewn through both loops of the edge stitches, to create a flat surface without any ridges.

There has been several rounds of sorting, counting, calculating and lining up the hexagons systematically...

...and then disorganizing the system to make the random look I wanted

Unlike George Costanza, who drapes himself in velvet, I am now ready to drape myself in an Oriental Garden Blanket! Hooray!!!

Don´t you forget about me

Happy New Blog Year! I believe in New Years wishes more than resolutions, and my most blog-related wish is simple: time to blog and even more important: time to make stuff to blog about! I am surprised if people still stop by to read my news as they are so rare... Well, I did actually get a comment or two during my absence which I truly appreciate - thank you :o) This is a colourful scarf for Princess made of one skein of Inka on 8 mm meedles. A perfect tv-knit for a quiet Holiday afternoon, finished in just a few hours. The pattern is simple: Cast on 15 (or another uneven number of) stitches. 1. row: *k1, p1*. Repeat from * to * and knit last stitch 2. row: *p1, k1 in previous rows stitch*. Repeat from * to * and purl last stitch 3. row: Slip first stitch as if to knit, *p1, k1*. Repeat from * to * Repeat 2. and 3. row until desired length or until you run out of yarn. NB! Save a few inches of yarn to cast off! PS At 2 o´clock this morning I FINALLY finished the Hexagon Blanket. The next post will most probably contain photos, facts and statistics about this (almost) everlasting project, so stay tuned! I just need some daylight to take named photos.