Child’s Play?

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Hello!

Last week my search for something simple to knit took me to Joure. This week it’s taking me to the past. Looking for inspiration on my book shelves, I came upon my very first knitting books.

For several years Ik leer breien (I’m learning to knit) parts 1, 2 and 3 were the only knitting books in our home. On the whole, knitting wasn’t something learnt from books, but rather from (grand)mothers, aunts, cousins or neighbours. And at school, of course. We did have a few magazines, too, I think, but most of those came later.

These three booklets were written by Mrs. A. H. Beyst, Needle Crafts Education Consultant for the City of Rotterdam (can you imagine having a job like that?). They were published by the International Wool Secretariat and the Dutch knitting yarn industry, and that shows. Besides knitting, they teach us a LOT about wool and yarn production – from sheep to skein.

 ‘Texel also has many sheep, but the best wool comes from Australia’, the International Wool Secretariat tells us. I skipped these parts of the booklets as a child (boring!), but find them interesting and amusing now.

There is no publication date in any of the booklets, but they came into my life around 1970, when I looked like this.

I remember the school photographer asking me to take off my hood and me refusing. It was cold and the hood was so nice and comfy.

Part one is aimed at children aged 6-10. It starts out with really simple, nice projects suitable for children that age, like this garter stitch sleeping bag for twin dollies.

It has a steep learning curve, though, with part one already explaining short rows. Personally, I wasn’t enthusiastic about the tea cosy, but I did enjoy knitting several striped clothes hanger covers.

In part 2 (for children aged 8 and up) we were taught to knit als grote mensen (like grown-ups), i.e. socks and mittens on 4 needles.

Although at that age I already was an avid knitter, I wasn’t really interested in knitting socks yet. And part 3 of the series (for the same age group) lost my interest completely. It is the weirdest little book, filled with endless variations on stitch patterns – knit-purl combinations, ribbing, lace, and most of all page upon page of slip-stitch patterns.

What was Mrs. A. H. Beyst thinking? Was she trying to put children off knitting for life?

Now, over 50 years later, I’m looking at Ik leer breien 3 with different eyes, seeing possibilities. Over the past week, I’ve been knitting swatches using and varying on slip-stitch and other stitch patterns from the booklet. I think there is something there that I could use for a simple project.

Slip stitches have become popular over the past few years, with Stephen West’s Slipstravaganza shawl as the most awe-inspiring example. For copyright reasons I can’t post a picture here, but it can be found here on Stephen’s website and here on Ravelry.

A picture of what I’d like to make and what yarn I could use is beginning to form in my mind. I don’t know exactly what it’s going to be yet, but I think it’ll include slip stitches and I’m certain that it’ll be far, far simpler and less flamboyant than Stephen’s creation.

Do you have old knitting books or magazines that you treasure, too? Or did you learn knitting entirely without them? I’d love to read about your memories!

Looking for Something Simple

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Hello!

Drawing up my knitting wish list for 2023, I forgot one thing. There is lots of interest in it: Norwegian knitting, design projects, challenging socks etc. What I didn’t think of at the time was that I also need something simple alongside.

At the moment a pair of simple socks in a plain, solid navy blue is fulfilling this role. The only interesting thing about them is that they’re from a yarn I’ve never used before – Lamana ‘Merida’.

When these are finished I’d like to start on a simple wrap/scarf/stole again. Something endlessly rhythmic and soothing. Something like this huge stole in a wide knit-and-purl rib I knit several years ago (blog post here):

Something like this only slightly smaller Striped Linen Stitch Wrap I’ve enjoyed knitting so much (blogged about here):

In short, I am looking for something utterly simple – no shaping, no seaming, no complicated stitch patterns – that will take a long time to knit. But what? I thought a visit to my nearest serious yarn shop might help me find the answer. It is in the Frisian town of Joure, a 20-minute drive from our home.

Joure isn’t the first place that would come to mind if people from elsewhere were to ask me what to visit in this region. It is just a nice, ordinary town, but it does have a few lovely spots and buildings as well as an interesting-looking museum (that I have yet to visit).

Joure also has a lively shopping street, although it struck me this time that here, too, as in so many other towns there are quite a few empty shops. Brick-and-mortar shops seem to be struggling everywhere. Strolling through the town centre is still very enjoyable, though.

And here we are at the yarn shop – Ajoure. There is a spinning wheel and some unspun and undyed wool in the window.

And inside there are walls, tables, cupboards, boxes and baskets filled with yarn, yarn, yarn and more yarn.

Many beautiful and expensive yarns, and also many more ordinary and affordable ones. And yet I don’t find what I am looking for. Not the shop’s fault – it’s just me being vague and indecisive. I don’t consider my visit fruitless, though. I’ve seen several yarns I’ll keep in mind for future projects, just spending some time in Joure was lovely, and I also picked up a leaflet telling me that the fabulous wool and sheep festival Joure onder de wol will be held again this year, on Saturday May 13th. If you don’t live too far away, that’s really something to look forward to.

Meanwhile, I’ll keep looking for something simple to knit. Bye for now and hope to see you again soon!

PS. And what about the people at the top of this post? Why are they standing there in the middle of Joure’s shopping street, gazing up at the sky? Are they looking for inspiration, too? Well, actually they are not gazing up at the sky, but at this:

The recently restored church steeple from 1628.

If You Keep Taking the Same Walk…

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Hello!

Our local beautician has a blackboard outside, along the street. On some days it says, ‘Hello beauty, you’re looking good today!’ On other days there is something on it like, ‘Why not treat yourself to one of our relaxing facials?’ (Am I not looking good today?) And sometimes she gives us food for thought.

This time it says, ‘If you keep taking the same walk, you’ll stop seeing new things.’

Hmm, well, yes, no, I don’t know. Is taking the same walk over and over again a bad thing? On the whole, I’m fine with the same old, same old. Not having to think about which route to take on a walk (or in life) frees up loads of mental space. And if you really look, there is always something new to see, even on the same old walk, even if it is just a bit of fresh graffiti on someone’s shed.

But then again, taking a different route can be enjoyable and bring some spice to life as well. For me, it’s all about finding the right balance. Take my knitting, for instance (it’s strange, how everything always comes back to knitting 😉).

A couple of years ago, a dear knitting friend came home from a trip to Germany with 2 beautiful skeins of sock yarn for me. I deliberated about what to make with them for a long time. Socks or shawl? Shawl or socks? The socks won. With one skein, I’ve gone the same old route I’ve been taking for ages – simple stocking stitch knit from the cuff down.

There was something new in them, though – a small percentage of yak down, making them very soft and warm. The yarn is Lana Grossa ‘About Berlin – Yak Relax’ (60% Wool, 25% Polyamide, 10% Yak; 100 g/420 m). It isn’t one of those yarns that automatically make a perfect pair, though. You need to look closely at the stripe sequence if you want the socks to be the same.

With the second skein, I’m taking a new route. My map for this route is in the book 52 Weeks of Socks that I got as a Sinterklaas present in December.

This is the beautiful linen bound hardback edition. A less expensive paperback version is also available now, and the book has also been translated into Dutch and German. And 52 Weeks of Socks II will be out soon.

Maybe you remember the Garia socks I knit before I owned the book (blogged about here). In case you just want to knit one pair, the patterns are also available through Ravelry separately. The next pair I’m making are the Linea socks, designed by Minna Sorvala.

These are knit from the toe up, a route I’ve taken before but not very often. What’s entirely new is that I’ve never knit a pair of socks with an all-over cable pattern.

There is a special Ravelry group called 52 Weeks Months of Socks. Joining this group doesn’t mean that you need to knit all 52 pairs of socks in the book, or I would never have joined. The idea is just to knit socks from the book together and help, encourage and inspire each other. A KAL (knit-along) for 2 pairs of socks is started every other month, with prizes and points to win. (I have yet to discover what the point of the points is.)

To win a prize or points for the Linea KAL, I should have posted a picture of my completed socks before February 28th. Too late. Well, never mind, the socks will be my prize. Here is the start of my Linea socks – not too difficult, but interesting and enjoyable so far.

That’s all for today. Hope to be here again next week with something new to talk about. See you then!

A Bit of a Puzzle

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Hello!

While I’m writing this, I’m sipping lemon-and-ginger tea with honey. I’ve just made a jug using the recipe in this post. It’s said to help with all kinds of ailments, and it also tastes good, too.

Today, I’d like to tell you about a cardigan for our grandson I’ve just finished, from a Danish pattern translated into German. The design is called Lykketræf, Danish for ‘A Stroke of Luck’. ‘A Bit of a Puzzle’ would be a more fitting name, if you ask me. My German is reasonably good, but looking at the pattern I felt panic rising.

Very dense print with lots and lots of abbreviations – without a list explaining the abbreviations! To make things more manageable, I highlighted the instructions for the size I was making and used a sticky note to keep track of where I was.

The cardigan is knit from the top down with a decorative pattern along the raglans. Working slowly, step by step, I was able to work things out in the end.

It took a while and quite a bit of ripping back to get there, though. To be honest, at first I had no idea what I was doing. What on earth did zun mean??? Ah, it must be zunehmen (increase). So, 1 M li zun must be ‘make 1 left leaning increase’, and 1 M re zun must be ‘make 1 right leaning increase’, right? But it didn’t look right.

So I got out some undyed DK-weight yarn and tried out the raglan decorations separately.

This showed me what the problem was. German links can mean both ‘left’ and ‘purl’. And rechts can mean both ‘right’ and ‘knit’. What I needed were purl and knit increases, instead of left and right leaning increases.

Okay, time to start anew. Was it plain sailing from there on? Uhm, not exactly. I won’t bore you with all my struggles, but there was quite a bit of ripping out and re-knitting (on 2.5 mm/US 1.5 needles) until I was happy with the buttonholes, the I-cord along the front edges and the bind-off. Fortunately the yarn stood up to it.

Fronts and back are knit in one piece from the armholes down. The sleeves are knit flat. I used mattress stitch for seaming them, joining a few rows at a time loosely before tightening the thread.

There is a great video explaining mattress stitch in garter here. Once you get into the rhythm, joining ‘smiles’ to ‘frowns’ (as the tutorial calls the different garter bumps) is a nice and contemplative thing to do, really.

And here is my finished Lykketræf cardi – the tiny olive wooden buttons are just what it needed.

I’m taking it with me on Monday, my regular day for looking after our grandson. Hope it fits. The wool-and-cotton blend feels like just the right kind of yarn for this in-between season. Although the weather forecast for next week promises us colder weather with wintry showers, there are many signs that spring is around the corner.

  • Pattern: Lykketræf by Bente Geil
  • Yarn: Geilsk ‘Bomuld og Uld’ (55% wool, 45% cotton, 50 g/254 yds/232 m)
  • My Ravelry notes here

Now it’s time to start something new – yay! Enjoy your weekend and see you again next week!

Lessons Learnt from a Pair of Lined Mittens

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Hello, and thank you so much for all your kind well wishes! For those of you with a similar bug: I hope you’ll get well soon. I’m not exactly brimming with energy yet, but grateful to be feeling much better, and glad to be able to pick up the thread of my blog, too.

So, here is the post I’d planned to write before I fell ill, about a pair of mittens I’ve knit for our daughter and the lessons I’ve learnt from them. The first reason I chose these mittens is their beautiful design details. Nice braids and a zigzag pattern on the cuffs and 8-point stars on the top.

A diamond pattern on the palm and a lovely motif on the thumbs.

The funny thing is that these mittens have a decidedly Norwegian look, but were designed by someone from Sydney, Australia, of all places. Do Australians need mittens at all? I’ve only ever heard my Australian relatives talk about the heat. Google teaches me the first lesson.

Lesson 1: Australians rarely need mittens, but sometimes they may (some parts of Australia even get snow!)

Around the entire mittens there is a decorative 3-stitch edge. I was afraid holes would form along the sides and at first pulled the threads tight. This made the stitches pucker and the brown Vs disappear in the white background – not nice at all.

Lesson 2: Gently does it – do not pull the threads tight when changing from one needle to the next on the sides of colourwork mittens, but gently guide one colour behind the other.

After finishing the hand of the outer mittens, stitches need to be picked up on one side of the thumb hole. For the first thumb, I just used my knitting needle. The result was okay, but not great. For the second thumb I tried something different.

Lesson 3: Picking up stitches for the thumb works best with a crochet hook – look how neat:

My second reason for choosing these mittens was that they are lined and therefore extra warm. For the outer mittens, the pattern had been perfectly clear. But when it came to picking up stitches for the linings I couldn’t make head nor tail of it. I spent a lot of time looking at other knitters’ Ravelry notes for clues, but couldn’t find anything helpful. And that brings me to the next lesson.

Lesson 4: When stumped, use your own common sense

The pattern said to pick up stitches ‘with right side of mitten facing’, but I couldn’t see how or where and picked up stitches on the inside. That worked out fine.

The instructions for the linings are not great. You need to turn the mittens inside out from time to time to check the length.

Following the instructions for the width and top, the linings became far too bulky and didn’t feel nice at all. So, I ripped them out and went down a needle size…
Ripped them out again and made them shorter…
Ripped them out again and tried a pointy top like the outer mittens. Nothing felt right…
Ripped them out again and tried making the entire finger section of the linings narrower…
Yes, finally they fit! They looked ugly and irregular, though…

Should I rip them out yet again and try different decreases? No! Nobody will ever see the linings. The most important thing is that they fit and feel nice.

Lesson 5: Not everything has to be perfect – sometimes good enough is good enough!

All in all, a great pair of mittens, and knitting them was an interesting process.

  • Pattern: Northman Mittens by David Schulz
  • Yarn outer mittens: Garnstudio Drops ‘Lima’ (65% wool, 35% alpaca)
  • Yarn linings: Blue Sky Fibers ‘Baby Alpaca Melange’ (100% alpaca)
  • My Ravelry project notes here

Floored by Flu

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Just popping in here to say hello and to tell you that I’ve been floored by flu. I didn’t want to just go off the radar for weeks on end. I’m on the mend and back to some knitting, but not up to much else yet. I hope you are healthy and well, and hope to be back with a real blog post next week. Bye for now!

The Beauty of Green Things

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Hello!

‘On some day of late January, when the honey-coloured west is full of soft grey cloud, when one lone minstrel thrush is chanting to the dying light, what is the thrill that shakes us?’ This is how Mary Webb starts The Spring of Joy (first published in 1917), a lovely collection of essays about the healing power of nature. This ‘thrill that shakes us’, she writes, is a sense of ‘oneness with all beauty, seen and unseen’.

It is early February now, and unlike the south of the country we haven’t had any snow so far. Over the past month the sky has often been ‘full of soft grey cloud’. Or a uniform dull grey. Or pouring with rain. How can we experience a sense of oneness with all beauty on days like that?

Well, there are subtler things than stunning sunsets and spectacular snowscapes. Webb writes about the beauty to be found in the movements, sounds and scents of nature. Or in shadow or shape. In the presence of an old oak tree…

… surrounded by sheep and buffeted by an invigorating breeze I know what she means.

In this little gem of a book, there is also an essay about The Beauty of Colour. According to Webb, ‘Of all colours, brown is the most satisfying.’ I don’t know about that, but I do agree with her when she writes: ‘In blue the spirit can wander, but in green it can rest’.

On the whole blue is my favourite colour – my spirit loves to wander. But at the moment I am also strongly drawn to green.

I’ve finished the Norwegian-patterned mittens for our daughter, woven in the ends and washed them. The last thing to do now is knitting in the linings. While the mittens were drying, I made a start on a green cardigan for our grandson knit from the top down:

The lovely fir-tree-like pattern along the raglan increases posed quite a puzzle. It’s taken me several attempts to get the hang of it, but I’m on the right track now.

And looking for something else, I came across a skein of a beautiful green tweed yarn. It’s been in my stash for a long, long time. Now I’d love to knit it up into something special, but what? A pair of mittens? A cowl? A hat?

Speaking of the beauty of green things and the healing power of nature, I’ve just finished reading Landlines by Raynor Winn. A dear friend gave it to me as a birthday gift last year. I didn’t read it straightaway but kept it to have something to look forward to for January. This is the hardcover edition – it is worth having for the beautiful dust jacket alone.

It is also very much worth reading. Landlines is actually the third book in a series. I haven’t read the first two (The Salt Path and The Wild Silence), but that wasn’t a problem – it can be read on its own.

The author’s husband, Moth, has a neurodegenerative disorder (similar to Parkinson and Alzheimer) for which there is no cure. He is told that his condition will only deteriorate. After this devastating diagnosis and subsequently losing their home, they make the unusual decision to walk the 630-mile-long South West Coast Path (described in the first book). This turns out to lead to a miraculous improvement in Moth’s health.

In Landlines, Moth’s health has gone downhill again and the couple set out for another long-distance walk, this time starting in the north of Scotland. It’s a moving personal story with unexpected twists and turns, interesting encounters and insights, and beautiful descriptions of the landscape and wildlife along the way.

Well, I’m going to make a start on the mitten linings now and hope to have them finished by next week. To close off here is a picture of some twists and turns in our most recent non-so-long-distance walk. Take care! xxx

NB: De boeken van Raynor Winn zijn ook in het Nederlands vertaald: Het zoutpad, De wilde stilte en Landlijnen.

Norwegian Mitten Inspiration

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Hello!

Knitting 24 tiny Norwegian Advent mittens and a pair of normal sized ones, has made me put ‘more Norwegian knitting’ on my list for 2023. That doesn’t necessarily mean more mittens, but looking for inspiration, I first of all pulled several Norwegian mitten books from my bookshelves. I thought you might like to look along with me.

The first one is Mittens from around Norway, by Nina Granlund Sæther:

This English translation of an originally Norwegian book contains 43 mitten patterns from many different parts of the country. There is obviously a lot of colourwork, but also some cables, knit-and-purl patterns, and a little lace.

There are large and clear photographs of the finished mittens and also photos of the museum pieces they were inspired by. With one or two exceptions, the mittens have been knit in widely available Norwegian yarns.

The next book is Selbuvotter: Biography of a Knitting Tradition by Terri Shea, also in English:

This is solely about black-and-white mittens (and gloves) in the Selbu tradition. The author has researched and reproduced part of the mitten collection of The Nordic Heritage Museum in Seattle as well as mittens from a private collection.

This book provides quite a bit of historical information and also goes into special techniques. It contains patterns for 31 pairs of mittens and gloves. Shea used Norwegian yarns for many of them, but also Shetland as well as some other yarns.

I brought the next publication home from a visit to Selbu (about 70 km south-east of Trondheim) – Selbustrikk:

This is only a thin booklet, but it contains a wealth of inspiration for mittens and gloves, as well as socks, hats and a few scarves. Again, everything in traditional black-and-white. It is in Norwegian, but the diagrams speak a universal language. By far the most of the patterns use Rauma Gammelserie yarn, and some of them Rauma Finull garn.

A must-see if you ever get the opportunity to visit this part of Norway is the Selbu Folk Museum, or Bygdemuseum. The museum has a lovely collection of mittens and other knitwear. My husband took the photo at the top of this post during our visit there. Here is a closer look:

Awe-inspiring, all those finely knit, beautifully patterned mittens and other knits, don’t you think?

Zooming out again to the entire country, here is one of the most beautiful knitting books on my shelves: Håndplagg til Bunader og Folkedrakter:

This 300-page tome (in Norwegian) is crammed with mittens, gloves and wrist warmers in all kinds of different knitting techniques. Many of them are embellished with embroidery or beads. The photography is stunning, and I don’t think I’ll ever tire of leafing through this book. So inspiring!

All of the above is inspiration FOR Norwegian mittens But why not take inspiration FROM Norwegian mittens as well?

Our next-door neighbours are expecting their first grandchild any day, and I thought I’d knit her a wee hat. I took the striped hat from Debbie Bliss’ Baby Cashmerino 2 booklet as a starting-point. But instead of knitting stripes, I looked at my Advent mittens for inspiration and came up with this:

A simple Norwegian-mitten-inspired baby hat – a satisfying little knit.

After looking through all these amazing mitten books, I still have no idea what my next Norwegian or Norwegian-inspired project is going to be. More mittens? Gloves or wrist warmers? Socks? A hat? Or even an entire sweater? Whatever it’s going to be, I’ll keep you posted!

Links:

If you’d like to read more about Norwegian mittens and can’t get hold of any of the books I’ve described, there is always the internet, of course.

Mitten Progress and a Walk

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It’s Sunday morning, 4˚C. Rain and hail storms are accompanied by strong gusts of wind. Fancy a walk? If you do, make sure to wear warm wind-and-waterproof clothes. And wellies, too, because the path will be flooded in places.

It can get quite busy here with walkers and cyclists, but today we seem to be the only ones. Why would that be?

No wait, there is someone there in the distance. It’s one of the shepherds with her two dogs and part of the flock. They are out in all weathers.

Walking here, I often think of the people who built these burial monuments.

How did the landscape look in their time? What was it like living here then? And what would they think, seeing us in our colourful synthetic outdoor clothing?

I am wearing a hand-knit woolly hat and cowl. But underneath my bright red polyamide rain jacket I’m wearing a polyester and elastane fleece sweater, and my hands are kept warm by fleece-lined machine-knit gloves. Fie! As a dedicated knitter, I really need to do something about that.

First the Northman mittens for our daughter and a few other things, though. I’ve started them again and have made quite a bit of progress. The first attempt was on the small side.

Going up a needle size, from 3.5 mm (US 4) to 3.75 mm (US 5), makes them slightly wider and longer. They’ll be the right size now, I think.

Writing this, I’m thinking of the book of Winterverhalen / Winter Tales, written by Dawn Casey and illustrated by Zanna Goldhawk. One of the stories is about a grandmother whose needles go clickety-click, clickety click…

… and a very special mitten, welcoming all animals seeking refuge from a storm.

A wonderful image, and a great book for both children and adults.

Well, time to close off. There is just one last thing. Towards the end of our walk the sun peeks through, and LOOK!

Making a List and Choosing Buttons

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Hello!

The New Year is well underway, and I’ve been thinking about where I’m going with my knitting. I didn’t make any resolutions or a list of goals. I feel a huge inner resistance to setting goals when it comes to knitting – as if the very word ‘goals’ will suck all the joy out of it. But drifting along and being pulled in all kinds of directions by whatever yarns or patterns cross my path, as I’ve often done, doesn’t feel quite right either anymore.

So, I am taking the middle road by making a wish list – a short list of the kind of things I’d like to do more of in the coming year:

  • Norwegian knitting
  • Making things for our grandson
  • Knitting challenging socks (at least more challenging than my ordinary stocking stitch ones)
  • Designing

It is rather vague, I know. Not very S.M.A.R.T. according to some. Will I get anything done without Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound goals? We’ll see. For now, I’m still finishing a few last things from 2022.

In 2021, at the time of year when the hydrangeas were in bloom, I bought two skeins of yarn from two dyers new to the craft (they can be found here and here):

The pale blue tweedy skein doesn’t know what it’s going to be yet. The other one has grown into a pair of simple stocking stitch socks.

I’ve also finished a simple stocking stitch Quintessential Cardigan from a soft navy blue wool-and-alpaca blend.

I wanted a medium-warm cardigan for everyday wear that would go with just about everything. It turned out exactly the way I wanted it, only maybe a little too… serious? Perhaps that could be remedied with buttons. I hadn’t bought any yet and got out my big button box. There might be some in there that I could use. Sifting through the buttons, I put all those in the right size on a tray.

The cardigan needed seven buttons, and I made several combinations. Six matching navy blue ones and a pop of red?

Nah, still too serious. Colourful retro?

Fun, but not really me. Seven silvery and shiny ones then?

Oooh, I really like those! But not with this navy blue cardigan. Okay, one last try:

Yes!

Not terribly adventurous perhaps, but hey, that’s me. I do hope to become a little more adventurous in my knitting in 2023, though. Oh, and I would also like to do more with the buttons in my button box – I’ll add that to my wish list. Now, where can I put the list so that I won’t forget about it?

How about you? Do you have specific knitting/crochet/other plans, goals or resolutions for 2023? I’d love to hear about them!