Lopapeysa - an icelandic sweater for kids

Last week, I finished a new lopapeysa (Islandpulli) for Freyr. I´ve knitted this yoke pattern from the book Lopi 2 several times, but never in this version with buttons half way down and a hood. Freyr loves hooded sweaters and because of that, his new, thick lopapeysa had to have a hood... since I wasn´t in the mood for making a zippered sweater, I decided to give this version a try - it was a lot of fun, I learned a lot on the way and I really like the way it turned out. The best thing is the fitting of the hood- it´s tight and comfy at the same time... and the high ribbing in the neck-area is perfect for a boy like Freyr, who loves to wear lopi.

yarn: lopi
needles: 4,5 and 6
Pattern: from Lopi 2

buttons: from my mothers treasure-chest...

love, love, love the hood...

the back:

... like the colours too...

From above:

crochet candle jars

Candle lights during the dark months in Iceland make me really, really happy and bring peace to my mind... maby that´s why I´ve been so busy making different kinds of candle light-jars lately?

My last one makes me "extra" happy because it´s my first crochet-light-jar I actually am able to make - maby my crochet-skills really are improving? I´m going to make more of those, using my handdyed einband... can´t wait to see how they turn out! One thing is sure, without this great tutorial by "Nature Nut Notes" I would never, ever been able to make this one...

so very cozy:

in light:

Star by nature

I´ve been spending A LOT of time on Pinterest lately... a dangerous thing, this Pinterest - you can spend so much time there, without even noticing! But I really do love that site, it´s so filled with great ideas and inspiration - I´ve been asking myself, at what point your head becomes overfilled with ideas?? Anyway, last week I found this pin... and thought, those twig-stars would be a fun and a pretty thing to do! A simple thing is so often the most pretty thing!

During a saturdaywalk with my boys and husband in the frosty winter-wonderland in Mosfellsbaer (where we live) we found some perfect twigs. Sunday, I made the stars... they are so simple and fun to make... all you need is:
twigs and yarn
a hot glue gun to fix the end of the yarn, if you roll it all around the star like I did ...

How to make them? You´ll see as soon as you look at the pictures... they are so very simple that you don´t even need an explanation!

The nice thing about those stars is, that you can use them in so many different ways - you just have to use your imagination... as a decoration-item on a gift (like I did), hang them in your window, on your front door (like I did)... do you have more ideas??

the 1. step: finding the twigs!

a basic-star (yarn: dyed with rhubarb)... as a decoration-item:

... covered with rhubarb-yarn (ends: fixed with hot glue) on my front door:

This is what we did with the remaining twigs: (yes, we are a bit desperate for

green leaves after all this snow and frost)

Our saturday walk in Mosfellsbaer: frosty, snowy and beautiful colours:

Mosfellsbaer (where we live here in Iceland)

Esjan (never looks the same - depending on the light)

A knitting needle roll

It always goes on my nerves how my knitting needles are all lying in a big chaotic bundle in my knitting needle-case... if I want double pointed needles nr. 3,5 I´ll have to search forever... and if I´m lucky enough I´ll find 5 of them...
Therefore I´ve been searching a good, free knitting needle roll-tutorial on the internet for a while now - and today the big day arrived: I finally made my very own knitting needle roll, mixing up those 2 tutorials: madebyloulabelle and lupinbunny.

I had to adapt the roll to my needs, since I never, ever use those 2, really long needles... this is the result and I´m really happy with it. The only thing I would do different next time is, to use thinner fabrics... maby just a thick one for the outside and thinner ones for the rest.

At last, I can find all the needles I need... I just can´t wait to make another one for my circular needles... just have to find the right fabrics...

open:

closed:

everything has it´s own, special place:

ahhh... finally some order...

all rolled up...

DIY: how to make a lace doily lantern

I must admit, I have a thing for lace-doilies... when I go to thriftstores I always keep my eyes open for them and often they follow me home, even if I don´t know what I´m going to do with them. They just look too pretty to leave them there!
Last winter I went to a kind of fabric-factory-outlet and found some really pretty ones and I decided I wanted to make some lanterns with them... well... one year later I finally did it! And that´s what I did:

You need:

1. Lace doilies...

I used those:

2. Hot glue:

3. Jars:

What to do:
This is so simple everyone can do this... you should try it with your kids!!! Well, after you´ve cut the doilies to the right size, you hot glue it to the jar. It´s enough to put only 1 vertical line of glue on the jar to make the ends stick to the glass...


1 doily was so thin I had to use 2 strings of it to cover the glass... I made it stick with 2 lines of glue... a horizontal around the glass and 1 vertical line:


This is the result: we love, love, love it...

Crochet flowers

I´ve been practicing crochet lately and since I don´t know how to read a crochet-pattern I´ve been using youtube... It´s amazing what you can learn from youtube! The possibilities for the use of pretty crochet-flowers are endless... as a decoration for hats, mittens, headbands, sweaters, handbags, a mobile...

I started with this very, very simple, small and cute flower by using this great tutorial. It´s so easy that even I, a total beginner can understand what´s going on...

nr. 1:

For those cute flowers I used my own, handdyed lace-yarn (einband, rhubarb and crowberries). For the hat I used kambgarn, needles nr. 2,5. The pattern is a bit modified one, from the book "prjóniprjón" and for the mittens I used this pattern by "handahlaup":

The tutorial for second flower I made was this one. It was very easy to follow as well and I learned a lot...

nr. 2:

The next flower I made was a bit advanced, but I had learned a lot, making the other 2 flowers, so I was able to do this one as well. Especially since this step-by-step tutorial, part 1and part 2 was very well done and also easy to follow. I really love, love, love this 3D Gardenia and I have about 1001 idea how to use it:

nr. 3:

At last we have my first, very own creation. Unfortunatly I don´t speak "crochet-language" and therefore can´t write a tutorial on how they are made (yet)... but I can tell you this much: if I am able to create my very own flower after making those above... you can do it too!

I used some of my own, handdyed yarn for those - left-over einband (lace), dyed with Rumex longifolius and rhubarb:

Rumex longifolius:

This is what I´m doing with them... I have about 32 to go... ;-)

Cinnamon rolls

Don´t you just love cinnamon rolls? I think this is a perfect baking-project for parents to do with their kids - at least my boys love to make those... and eat them!

I got this recipe for cinnamon-rolls with apples, many years ago and I love it just the way it is - there are only 2 things I have changed... the first thing is the way I make the dough, since I have a breadmaker now which makes the whole process even more easy! The second thing is the topping... the original recipe doesen´t have any topping, but I often use a delicious toffee-topping-recipe a friend of mine gave me...

I have to admit, that I don´t know where I got this recipe... but I have it written down by hand in my recipe-book where I keep my favorites all together...

Cinnamon rolls - the dough:
3 dl milk (lukewarm)
3 tsk dry yeast
50 g butter
25 g sugar
1 tsk salt
1 tsk grounded cardamom
400 g flour

Filling:
1 grated apple
1 tsk cinnamon
25 g sugar
25 g melted butter

Toffee-topping:
50 g butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp corn syrup
1 tbsp water

What to do: (if you don´t have a breadmaker)
1. Mix the yeast and the milk together. After that: add sugar, salt and cardamom.

2. Melt the butter, and add it together with 2/3 of the flour to the milk-mixture. Mix well and let this very wet mixture rest for about 40-50 minutes.

3. Add the remaining flour to the mixture and knead the dough until it feels manageable, soft and doesn´t stick to your hands anymore.

4. Roll out to a size of approximately 60x30 sm:


5. Filling: mix everything together and spread on the dough you just rolled out...


6. Cut the dough-roll into pieces and place them on your baking-pan. Let them rest for at least 30 more minutes under a dishcloth... then they should look like something this:



7. Topping: I sometimes just spread a stirred egg over the cinnamon-rolls before I put them in the oven. Or you can use the toffee-topping-recipe above... you just mix all the ingredients together in a pot and stir for a few minutes until it is thick, sticky and looks yummi like this:



You spread the topping on the cinnamon-rolls after they have been in the oven for about 5 minutes (take the rolls out of the oven - spread the toffee-topping - put them back in and bake until ready)..

8. Bake for for about 15 minutes (180-200°C) ... and enjoy!!!

A new year and changes

a walk on the 1. january

I've been thinking a lot about the new year and some changes I would like to make regarding my blog. I started thinking, why do I love reading some of my favorite blogs? I came to the conclusion that the following things are among the things that keep me coming back:

1. When I read other blogs, I really like it, when creative people show us what they are doing, and how they do it... for example in step-by-step-pictures.

2. I also like challenges, for example 7 pictures in 7 days, 10 hats in 10 weeks or something that...

3. Nice pictures (like rodprjonar or knittingmydayaway) and diverse content (like "systraseiður")

4. I also like theme-days, that is... doing the same things on certain days like Cheri does on her blog "iammommahearmeroar": "wake-up-wednesday" or "sunshine sunday"... I´d love to find something similar for myself... maby something that has to do with goal-setting, food and creating things I haven´t done before... we´ll see...

Having realized this, I´d like to keep these 4 things in mind this year and start with a step-by-step-post tomorrow about something very tasty and an exciting challenge after that... ;-)

Regarding good pictures: It can be a bit hard, getting good pictures in Iceland at this time of year, since we only have about 5 hours daylight, but I´ll try to use those few hours wisely to get good pics...

I have enough ideas to keep the content of my blog diverse... I´ll just have to DO more... perform more...

I wish you all a happy new year, filled with a lot of love, peaceful moments with your beloved ones, creativity and joy!!!!!!!!!!!