A magnitude 6.3 earthquake and a finished dress

I had collected Hjalti from the daycare and we were enjoying the good weather, sitting outside on the lawn in the back yard when the 3rd large Suðurlands-earthquake occurred last Thursday, May 29th, at 15:36. Wow, it was so exciting to feel the noise, the high frequency vibration of the P-wave and then the shear motion of the S-wave and then the surface waves, right under my bottom! Thousands and thousands of aftershocks have occurred since, probably close to 8000 events. You can just imagine how exciting this is for a geophysicist.

As the earthquake struck, I was knitting the neckline of the lopi dress which I’ve been working on since March. Despite of the rising temperature (just checked the thermometer here at work/the Met Office which shows more than 13°C) I convinced myself this morning that it was actually cold and it wasn’t such a bad idea to wear it today. It turned out to be a sunny day, but very windy

Unfortunately, I can’t show you any pretty pictures, just this one which I took while it was still drying

Two sleaveless pullowers and a lace dress

Monday morning, and no work. How nice. Hjalti and Böðvar are fast asleep upstairs and I have a quiet, spare moment on my own. I cannot remember when I finished these two létt-lopi pullowers, sometime in February. I took photos a while ago, but managed somehow to delete the ones from the black one so I took it out last Thursday, and snapped a photo in the afternoon sunlight. I knit the black and red west for Böðvar’s elder daughter. She chose the pattern and colours (same colours as were shown for this pattern, of course but when it came to wearing it she didn’t really like it. Something with the wool, she feels that it itches.

Oh well. I cast on for another one for her younger sister. That one was based on a pattern no. 11 (Týra, which is a dog’s name)  from a Ístex pattern book no. 25. There it is a sweater with sewn-in-sleaves and a different colour-scheme than here, but I liked this base colour better (it’s warmer) plus  I used leftovers for the pattern. I’m very happy with the result, and I guess she’s too, at least she uses it:

The pullowers are both knit it létt-lopi (lopi light) on 4.5 mm needles (4.0 mm for the edges). After finished them I decided it was about time I did something for myself! So, naturally, I went shopping. I decided to stick to the icelandic wool and bought enough material for two dresses: one létt-lopi dress and one lace dress made of thin einband (single spun), which can be found in ístex’s new pattern book, Einband. I started in the beginning of March and finished the lace dress a week ago, so it took me two months to knit it.

I wore it for the first time last Thursday, and again yesterday to a confirmation party. I changed the original colours slightly and used shades nr. 1038, 0885, 0853 and 0852.

For the past two months, I’ve gone on two trips abroad for work, to Naples and Vienna. In both trips, I had to take two flights to reach the destination. This sums up to 8 flights, which really helped for making progress with the lace dress! Now with this one finished, I’ve started to work on the létt-lopi dress again. I finished the single-coloured body  yesterday and started the sleaves. Cannot wait to finish, because I have something special on my mind which I want to try.   

 

Two hats

Last month, I knit a hat as a birthday present for Böðvar (boyfriend). I chose Jared’s Koolhas hat pattern, which I find absolutely smashing. I dug up some rests of Rowan Magpie in black, since B. likes it simple. It has quite rough texture and I thought it would fit very well with the pattern to make it look something Böðvar would like. Anyway, it takes quite some time to work with the cable needle in every second row (or was it every row?), but when I had just begun the decreasing at the top, I was out of yarn. Oh, this was frustrating. I checked Rowan’s web site but could not find the Magpie yarn. Still a bit hopeful, I paid a visit to the yarn store to check. It wasn’t available. A little less hopeful, I checked Ebay. I found Rowan-Magpie, but not in black. Now, to save all the work done, I ripped the knitting down to the beginning of the decrease, twice, and finally managed to finish the hat properly using the yarn I had left. It turned out very well and not too short at all, or so I think:

And I actually think it looks very good on him. Thus, I was quite sad when he later told me that he thinks it is a bit girly. Especially when someone at school mentioned it was. Argghhh. And he’s wearing the old hat again…

I also knit a hat for my mother using the Foliage hat pattern from Knitty. I used one strand of Dale-Falke and one strand of Kitten Mohair (from Sandnes garn) held together. It’s very soft, but perhaps a little to wide

Finally, after knitting two lopi-wests for Böðvar’s two daughters (the subject of next post), I decided to do something for myself. At the moment, I’m working on two dresses. One is with a classical lopapeysa-yoke pattern, the other one is a lace dress. I’m so excited to finish and wear them, that I totally neglect the hosehold. My home is a mess! And I even forgot to do the tax-report until one hour before the deadline last night! Fortunately, I got an extension

Some more Kambgarn stuff

A little more than three years ago, I cast on for a toddler’s pullover. I’m happy I didn’t get the chance to give it away to the one it was originally ment for, because it is really nice for Hjalti. I wove the ends in (with a little help from Böðvar’s mother) and washed it very recently

The pattern shows various animals: sheep, cows, ducks, pigs and flowers. I really like it, it is in the Ístex pattern book nr 19, Kambgarn, which I mentioned earlier in last post. It is the only published pattern book for Kambgarn that I know of.

I had forgotten that the matching mittens had already been knitted, so several days ago I finished the detail work

And more Kambgarn? In November, I mentioned to three of my friends whether they wanted to make a blanket for a common friend of ours, that had recently given birth to her first baby. To my surprise, they all agreed to do their part, and last weekend, I finished the knitted crochet edge and washed it, I’m very pleased with the result:

We plan to give it away next weekend. I’m very excited to see the look on her face. I think she has no idea what we’ve been up to

1 year old

A week ago, Hjalti turned one year old. How time flies…

Since last entry, he now knows how to sit and stand up on his own, walk with support, and point to things he likes to have and grab almost anything he wants Motherhood is certainly demanding and I feel like I have very little time for knitting. But still, I have made several small projects recently and plans for several more. The theme of recent projects has first and foremost been: use up stash. And there is certainly the need to, since I own four 40 litre plastic boxes down in the storage room, plus yarn probably to fill two more. So, first I made mittens for my niece Arna, for her 1 year birthday in November.

Pattern: based on pattern “Fjóla” from pattern book nr 19 Kambgarn from Ístex and cross stich from book on Rósavettlingar

colour scheme: my own

yarn: Kambgarn nr. 9667 and 0945

needles: 3.0 mm double pointed (five) needles

Then, during Christmas, I used the same pattern to make another pair for Hjalti

yarn: Kambgarn nr. 9667 and 9656

needles: 2.5 mm

It shows that they have been used daily for the past two months. The sad news is, however, that one mitten got lost last Tuesday, when Hjalti went for a ride in the car with his father. Oh well, I obviously have to knit a string to tie the next pair together.

Then there was the hat and booties I made for my friend’s daughter, born 21st November:

Since christmas, I have been working on a cabled pullover for Hjalti (still not finished) , I finished two hats, a lopi west and maybe something more I might have forgotten at the moment. So, plenty more for next post, which shall appear soon. Promise

Tonight, I will attend the knitting cafe in Kópavogur and work on a recently started project: a dress. See you there!