Cowl-mania

In the last few years, I´ve made a lot of mittens and slippers for my friends and family at chrismas. This year, I really wanted to make something totaly different AND I really wanted knit most of the christmasgifts... I ended up by making a lot of cowls/eternity-scarfs (and of course, some mittens and slippers too, for those who haven´t got that from me yet ;-)

I started by making a popular cowl I found on Ravelry called "Gap-Tastic-Cowl", using icelandic wool: lopi (hespulopi). After that I made them all up, playing around with colours and some knit/purl-patterns, using lopi (hespulopi). I was really happy with all of them - but one of them in particular... for that one I´m going to release my first pattern in january... so there are more cowls to come...

Gap-Tastic-Cowl for Lóa - the first one...

Gap-Tastic-Cowl for Lóa - the first one...

Gap-Tastic-Cowl for Lóa - the first one...

My own modified version of the Gap-Tastic-Cowl: for kids (made 3 of those)

My own modified version of the Gap-Tastic-Cowl: for kids (made 3 of those)

My own modified version of the Gap-Tastic-Cowl: for kids (made 3 of those)

My own modified version of the Gap-Tastic-Cowl: for kids (made 3 of those)

Cowl for Hanna - my own creation
Cowl for Hanna - my own creation

Cowl for Hanna - my own creation
horrible picture of a great cowl (so sorry, but it´s the only one I have) - my own creation

Felted...

Ever since I saw a post about felted balls and got some great ideas on what to do with them, on the very fun blog:
"systraseiður",
... I´ve been wanting to make my own felted balls.

I asked my very good friends Google and Youtube for advice and found this:
1. Youtube: making feltballs with Rachel Greenland

2. Martha Stewart (btw: you can find just about everything there... I just love this website): "how to felt balls"

I thought this would be a fun project to do with my boys, so I picked them up early from Kindergarten last week, and we got some wool (ullarkemba) together at the wool factory-outlet Álafoss. The two of them (and me too ;-) had so much fun all the way on this felting-journey... picking the colours and the wool, rolling the wool between our hands and dipping them in the soapwater. The whole thing had a very calming effect on the us and we listend to some nice christmasmusic while rolling and squeezing the wool... we love the result... this is such a great way to spend some quality time with your kids!



Something green...


Something red...


Experimenting...


My white ones...


Something purple...


Some more experimenting...


Creative Freyr...




Creative Bidenam...

The versatile blogger award

I was happy to discover, that I´ve been nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award by KnittingMyDayAway! The feeling is mutual, since I love all of Johanna´s designs and am always waiting excited for her next post! Thank you so much Johanna!

The rules for the Versatile Blog Awards are:

Nominate 15 fellow bloggers.
Inform the bloggers of their nomination.
Share 7 random things about yourself.
Thank the blogger who nominated you.
Add the Versatile Blog Award picture on your blog post.

Here´s a list of the blogs I read, some of them are in Icelandic (sorry for those who don´t read Icelandic ;-)

1.RodPrjonar: comes from Chile, but lives in Iceland. He creates beautiful things (mostly knitting) and makes wonderful pictures. Reading his blog is a joy!

2. I´m momma hear me roar: this wonder-woman must be one of the most creative bloggers of all times... this lady seems to be able to do almost everything! Love love love reading her blog and everything she does for her two little boys since I have two of those myself! You can find some really nice tutorials on her blog, I really recommend...

3. maya*made: is a creative lady who creates wonderful things, has a lot of good ideas and makes beautiful pictures...

4. Ragnhilds cubicle: lives in Norway, and her blog is mostly about crafts, restyling, cooking and life in general... she also makes wonderful pictures!

5. Skreytum hús: Dossa is a very creative, wonderful, icelandic lady. She makes wondeful things, decorates, restyles and always has some good ideas... it´s really inspiring reading her blog!

6. Handóð: comes from Iceland and she loves everything that has something to do with crochet and I really like the things she creates. Her latest post is a free pattern for a lovely blanket...

7. My Sparkle: does a lot of different things and has some really nice patterns and tutorials on her blog! My favorite one is the "how-to-rolled-flowers-tutorial"!

8. Annekata: a creative blogger, who always has something interesting to show or tell us... she has some nice patterns and tutorials on her blog... my all-time-favorite is her tutorial on super simple Paper Stars.

9. Paper Raindrops: another creative blogger on my list... she makes interesting, humorful pictures, does some nice things and what I really like about her blog is, that she likes to show us WHAT she is creating and HOW she did it!

10: Barbietec: icelandic blog... I find her blog very inspiring... she writes about nutrition, sports and cooking.... after reading her blog I always feel like running, swimming and making some changes to my diet!

11. Made By Rae: sews and crafts wonderful things... she has some wonderful patterns and tutorials on her blog! Love her big butt baby pants sewing pattern...

12. Made: this creative lady sews, cooks and crafts... she has some wonderful patterns, tutorials and recipes on her blog...

13: Strikkelisa: a knitter who creates beautiful things! This wonderful cowl is my favorite...

14: Allerhand Wundermurmeliges: lives in Germany, always has some good ideas and lovely pictures!

And now, 7 random things you might not know about me:
- I have always LOVED owls... and butterflies... since I was a young child ("butterfly" was one of the first words I learned in english)
- I have a tatoo on my back, between my shoulder blades: a black, tribal butterfly
- I lived 10 years in Freiburg, Germany
- I really love everything Astrid Lindgren has ever written
- I have a thing for organization and use my own version of SCRUM at home...
- I really love origami
- I like drawing, especially cartoon drawing.

Mittens from Egilsstaðir (Rósastrengsvettlingar)

I am knitting mittens for two young women. At first, I was thinking of making something out of the wonderful and soft kambgarn but I decided not to, since that isn´t really icelandic wool, even if it´s produced by ístex - and I wanted those mittens to be very icelandic, traditional, ladylike and at the same time warm.

These kind of mittens with that lace-pattern, made out of icelandic "einband, loðband" are very traditional icelandic and festive. Of course, I used my own yarn...
the brown: lichen (skófir)
the intensive yellow: rumex longifolius (njóli)... love, love, love those colours! The light was quite good, so that the colours come out quite well on most of those pictures.

I still have to make one more pair of mittens and I´m using rhubarb-yarn (one colour) for them.
This is a very fun and rewarding knit, even if it isn´t really a quick one...

Little treasures

My most precious things, are small treasures made by my two wonderful sons, age 3 and 5 in Kindergarten... when I look at those things, I think of my boys, and that just makes me happy :-)

Bidenam made this wonderful felt-heart for me - it´s hanging in the chandelier in our livingroom

My younger one, Freyr made this felted wool-thing some time ago - I just love it... it´s wooly, incredibly cute and he made it by rubbing together wool, water and soap with his small hands.
It´s hanging in the chandelier in our livingroom, along with Bidenams heart

Love this cute, red worm-like part, that´s looking out of the white egg-like wool

Bidenam made this pretty bird during his first year in Kindergarten with only 2 years... it´s so simple, creative and so very beautiful.

Bidenam made this one last week... I actually wear it because it makes me happy... it´s colourful, simple and made with a lot of love, patience. joy and hard work for me...

Bidenam painted those some time ago - on the left is a girly octopus and on the right: 2 friendly sharks... too cute and they are hanging on the wall in front of my desk - so that every time I look up from the computer I look at those friendly faces.

This one is for you Jóhanna...