Gone for too long!

I must admit that blogging has taken a back seat for the past two to three months.  Getting ready  for Christmas, I was really going strong and loved sharing everything I made for everyone on my gift list ! Since then I have spent all my time on ...... Not even important. Being back online is important to me, so as a late new year resolution I have promised myself to be a lot more active, and not only stick to Instagram. Even though I must admit that it is fun and instantly gives feedback! 

I have also decided that I will make my blog bilingual. As I am a Dane, but living in the US, I think it is only appropriate that I use both languages  here. 

And now to the creative part of this. I have been doing all kinds of things lately, which I primarily have shared with my very creative little group here at our weekly gatherings. And then off course on Instagram.  But I will try to put as much of it up here over the next couple of weeks. 

Let me start with a little crochet needle holder that I made recently. I got the pattern from two danish girls Isabella and Rosa and their blog "Garnkusserne". For the pattern please click here.

Jeg må indrømme at blogge ikke har været det jeg har brugt tiden på igennem de sidste to, tre måneder!  Som forberedelse til julen var jeg langt fremme i skoene og fik delt hvad jeg havde lavet til de forskellige på min gaveliste.  Siden da har jeg brugt alt min tid på…..slet ikke vigtigt. Men at være tilbage er vigtigt for mig, så som et sent nytårsløfte har jeg lovet mig selv, at være mere aktiv og ikke kun bruge Instagram, selvom det bestemt heller ikke er at kimse af. Det er sjovt og giver umiddelbar feedback.

Jeg har ogå besluttet, jeg vil gøre min blog to-sproget. Jeg er jo dansker, men er blot bosiddende i USA, så hvorfor ikke bruger begge sprog her.

Og nu til den mere kreative del af dette. Jeg har lavet alle mulige ting over de sidste par måneder, som jeg primært har delt med min lille kreative arbejdsgruppe. Nu vil jeg prøve at dele så meget som muligt her over de næste par uger.

Lad mig starte med et lille hækle hylster jeg lavede forleden. Mønstret har jeg fundet hos Isabella og Rosa fra "Garnkusserne". Her er et link til mønstret.

Christmas sock, scandi style

On the amazing blog Lutter Idyl I spotted this fantastic Christmas sock. It looked fantastic.  I was not surprised. I am a huge fan of Jeanettes work, it is always new and very inspiring. Often with a choice of interesting colors. I love that blog.  Variations of Christmas stockings I had seen before, we're limited to knitted or sewn ones. This one all made up of 16 crocheted hexagons was a must do.

My first attempt was for my daughter,  who absolutely loves Christmas and everything it entails. Needless to say we have already been listening to Christmas music for more than a week now!

She is also of the belief that Christmas has to de done in traditional colors. Not sure where that comes from,  as I would love to decorate with alternative colors. But never the less traditional colors it is.

Jeannette from Lutter Idyl have made a great tutorial for this, that was very accessible. If you followed instructions you would be fine. As usual I am not good with reading manuals, directions you name it, so I had a few u-turns. In the end after a weekend of spending all my free time crocheting hexagons, this is the result, which I was actually quite pleased with.

My next project is a stocking for my son. When I asked him if he would like one like this, his answer came promptly: "yes mom but could you add som HO HO HO's?" 

So that has keept me awake for the past couple of nights, (only kidding) and now I think I have an idea how to do it, without having to look at two totally different stockings hanging from the mantel.

simplicity

Another visit to another fiber event! Stitches East - also called the Knitting Convention had reached Connecticut last weekend. Off course I had to check it out. It didn't feature as many vendors, as I remember seeing last year, but we did find some interesting yarn. One of them I would like to introduce you to here. It is from a little company called Habu textiles. Originally Japanese I believe, but they also have a store in New York. They sell beautiful yarns and textiles, that isn't "necessarily practical" as they state but beautiful and it is the aim  for the artist to be inspired by the yarn and create something beautiful.  They have the finest mohair, line paper warped in nylon string, jute in an alternative form and the list goes on. Check out the website, as stylish and simple as the yarn they sell

This yarn doesn't look like much, but it is in fact warped silk. I just had to buy it and see how it would look made into "fabric".

As there isn't more than 78 meters in this little skein I decided to do a little coin purse.

The finished fabric comes out a little stiff, but I was still afraid that I wasn't able to make it stay within the purse frame, so I stitched a thread of jeweler string around the top edges, to make sure I would be able to push it into the frame. 

And here is the finished result.

And a close up of the stitch. It actually looks really cool.

Reading blogs this week;  I also admired the kit that have been created by Susanne a danish design student. She is also behind the blog Rumfang. Susanne has created the kit as an assignment for her design study. Check out her blog and read about the story behind the pattern and the trends in design this fall 2013.  Susanne has decided to give one kit away as a December Give-Away, so that is another reason to visit.
Here is the beautiful cushion. I love the simplicity and great colors too.

Have a wonderful weekend.

  

Chunky wool experience.

I attended New England Fiber Festival last weekend and it was as always a lot of fun. It is off course all about fibers and there was plenty of that. In all shapes and forms from "still on the lama or sheep" to the most amazing yarns you could think of. 

I have for a long time wanted to try to make something out of the very chunky yarn that I have seen on blogs and websites.

I visited Silver Oak Farms booth and found this. 

 Unfortunately the picture doesn't give the wool credit it looks very brown here, but it is actually a very nice shade of grey.

My initial idea was to make a soft and durable rug, but even though I had about 90 yards, it would only make me a very little rug, so I decided on a basket for my ongoing knitting and crochet projects.

Started out while I was preparing dinner last night and finished less than 11/2 later. 

It works up very quickly as you can see. I used a 20 mm crochet hook.

 And here is the finished project after I steamed it last night.

Wish I had enough for a chunky afghan. 

My deal with the squirrels

I have been collecting acorn caps over the past few weeks. As they were very rare to find last year, I have secured a big pile to make sure we get through the winter. Normally I make felted acorns of raw wool. This year I decided to try and crochet the little nuts.

Not hard at all, this is how I did it.

- Start out with a magic loop and a 3.5 mm crochet hook. 

- make 5 single crochet into the loop and pull it together into a circle.

- next row is simply 2 single crotchets into each of the chains from the previous round 

- continue to crochet single crotchets into each of the 10 chains that is now forming the   
    base of the acorn. 

- depending of the size of the acorn cap, do between 5-7 rows of single crochet stitches.

As the top of the crocheted nut will be covered by the cap I just filled the hollow nut with fiberfill. To secure the filling inside, simply just crochet into every second chain from the previous row and keep going till the nut is closed up.  I used hot glue to secure the nuts under the caps.

During the summer we went to Denmark. On my to do list while we were there was to go and check out the yarn store yarnfreak in Århus .  I have followed Camilla's blog for a while and was very inspired by some of her postings. To my husbands horror, there was quite a lot of yarn in the store, I couldn't live without. Even though it meant bringing it all on a plane to the US! 

The yarn I have used for these acorns are 100% mercerized cotton called Rio from the Dutch yarn company Lammy which Yarn Freak stocks in all kinds of colors. 

Scarf for the pumpkin season.

Another Christmas present to an older member of the family. This shorter version of a scarf was fun to make, as I tried out a new, to me, technique: The foundation stitch. Basically you make the foundation chain along with the first row, in one go. The pattern used was  this one from Purlbee.

There is a tutorial on how to make the foundation single crochet stitch. I had a go with the tutorial on a friday evening and after several attempts I gave up.  I think it was described in way too many details. I found an easier photo tutorial on you tube. 

In order for the scarf not to be too bulky, and be able to look a little more conservative, I added the little snippet on the back as a "lock" for the scarf. That makes it drape really beautiful.

Crochet has a ring of old fashioned to it, maybe because we tend to  associate it with our grandmothers. I still remember how my grandmother made chair covers for the armrests on her upholstered lounge chairs.  Probably not something we would spend too much time on today. The simple stitch here doesn't look one bit old fashioned, in my opinion, so maybe with all the fantastic new crochet designers out there, it will be possible to change the image of crochet. 

Package to Denmark

I have frantically been working on Christmas presents for the past month or so. Decided that many of my gifts this year should be homemade.  It still seems that Christmas is far away, but when you have the opportunity to get your shipment to friends and family in Denmark without the help of US Postal Services,  I really need to take it. That means all packages have to be ready to send of in two weeks.  Still a way to go, but here is a little sneak peek at one of the little presents.

  The inner part of the cushion is made of one skein of the fabulous."Knit Collage". This particular one is the "Raindance".

The back and the rim of the cushion is crochet in a 100 % thick merino wool.  It was a lot of fun making this. Only challenge was to get the little sparkle items, that originally was part of  the Saries that this yarn is recycled from, to end up on the front of the cushion!

As the entire cushion is made in single crochet stitches (Double crochet (UK) and Fastmasker (DK), into the back stitch of the previous round of stitches, it was very easy to sew together at the end.  The two sides almost blend together.

Knit Collage can be bought all around the world. Vendors can be found on their website: www.knitcollage.com  I found my first skein in a little fun Art Store in the tiny town of Chester, CT ( normally don't sell yarn, but who could resist this?) and when I needed more for my Christmas presents I just found a stockiest locally.