Nordic Heritage Museum #9

I began teaching myself how to knit a few years ago. I never made it to a knitting class, instead I watched some online tutorials and invested in knitting books. I bought a few basics books to help me understand how stitches worked and how to solve problems and a few books with pattersn. When we move my knitting books take up a box!

I have come to love knitting. It's a craft that allows me to pick colors and patterns, but that ultimately involves counting and math and straight lines (not that I'm particularly good at math, but I can count). I have had to be a little creative with the patterns because typically I'm not knitting with the yarn that is recommended by the pattern. Although there is a knitting shop here in Red Lake Falls, it's only open twice a week and has limited hours. And, I am not familiar enough with yarns to be able to confidently buy online. So, once I have some yarn I try to make it work with whatever project fits my whim!

One of the books I've knitted from is Selbuvotter, Biography of a Knitting Tradition. I love this book, it has a lot of history and beautiful patterns. The author, Terri Shea, studied samples of Selbu mittens from private collections and museums and provides patterns, instructions, and stories.

Unfortunately for me, the pattens are crafted with specific yarns - which I don't have. I knit my very first pair of selbu mittens for Calhoun last winter, but they did not fit very well. They are the size of pancakes.

So, I tried again this winter. I did some actual measuring with the yarn I had on hand and successfully knit some mittens that fit! I took my inspiration from her pattern that was created from a sample in the Nordic Heritage Museum, Pattern #9.  I cut the pattern down to fifty stitches around instead of 72, I made it shorter in the hand and messed with the thumbs.

I finally finished and wore them and they are AWESOME! I feel like I have finally gotten a hang of this whole 'knitting Selbu mittens' thing!

Then I stopped by The Yarnery while we were in the cities for Thanksgiving and they didn't have the yarn I knew I needed. I bought something different. Looks like the next Selbu mitten project will be another test of my creativity, I can't wait to get started!

Oh hello, fandom

I've been absent from the blog for a while. My absence is partially because I find that when I get behind on posts it becomes really hard for me to catch up, and it's also because I've just been busy!

For example, I have this great picture of my niece Blueberry, and have been trying to find ways to talk about how great it is to see her when I go to the Cities and how hard it is sometimes to be so far away and how happy and blessed I am to have such great family and friends who are supportive even though they are hundreds of miles away. It was going to be a good post, except I couldn't get the words together so I just stalled - which means you ultimately get the short version.

Blueberry, so wonderful!

I've also been meaning to write about my knitting. I finished my first pair of selbu mittens, from the book Selbuvotter: Biography of a Knitting Tradition. Besides the fact that they don't fit so well (they're really big and resemble pancakes, but they fit Calhoun well if he wears gloves inside of them) I am very proud of my project and really have wanted to share it with you! But I stalled - and you get the short version again.

Then, last Tuesday, something happened that changed my life. So, thanks to this new hobby of mine called 'reading' and the impending release of The Hunger Games, the first book of the series arrived in my mailbox last Tuesday, courtesy of Swan. I have this natural aversion to all things popular and cannot believe that kept me away from this series for so long. Snelling was 100% right, this is a great read! I'm sure that my obsession was fueled by the fact that the real life love of my life, blue eyes and all, was away for the week that it took me to finish the series (that's right, finished in 7 days and even still went to work during that time), but it was AWESOME. I cannot wait to see the movie and I am afraid I have entered fandom on this one...I'm already reading it again!

Swan mailed me her copy of the book, complete with fruit snacks to keep me going! Thank you!

So, I guess that's all good news right? I'm doing things? Seeing friends and family in the cities, finishing knitting projects and becoming obsessed with fictional characters thus keeping me away from the blog. Apparently I need to develop more hobbies that allow me to write while I hobby? Or not...

I hope this spring and great weather finds you well!

Blueberry and Baby Things

Nokomis and Eveleth had a BABY! She's beautiful and it means I'm an Aunt for the first time and I'm SO EXCITED!

Blueberry was born two weeks ago and everyone is healthy and happy and doing well. I'm loving it, because it means I get to buy and make baby things!

So, here's the first one. This awesome Minnesota onesie came from Corazon. Corazon is such a fun store, filled with neat, creative, sweet, funny things that you can spend the whole day looking at and laughing at. This is one of the sweet things:

And then, there are my handcrafted baby gifts! I made these baby booties! Look at my knitting skills go! I'm just a little sad that Blueberry is a summer baby and has no need for booties or sweaters or other things knit, but I'm making progress and by fall this kid is going to have more sweaters and booties than she or her parents will know what to do with! Ha! The joys of being an aunt!