Just in time

Härjarö, a photo by Asplund on Flickr.

Last weekend I was lucky enough to be one of the workshop leaders in this beautiful building. What's more, I was lucky to get there in time (well, two minutes before my first workshop started) as something went wrong with the car I was going to borrow from a friend. This happened on Friday evening and I needed the car in the morning... Born to knit and I had to take the train to the nearest town instead, where one of the participants was kind enough to pick us up and drive us to Härjarö.

It would have been great to be able to stay the whole weekend, but a dear colleague of mine had a birthday party in the evening, so I had to rush from the knitting event as well - picked up by someone else who was going there and was kind enough to drive all the way to get me. There's nothing like friendliness!

What do you think I gave my colleague - a lace shawl, a polar-bear rug or my nephew?

Correct answer: a shawl based on Marianne Kinzel's "English Crystal" design in her First Book of Modern Lace Knitting. Yarn: "Viva" from Wetterhoff; 4 mm needles (US 6).

In reality the shawl is raspberry red. I'm not sure Kinzel would have approved as she cautions the reader not to use yarn "of a conspicuous colour, as this is not in the lace-making tradition." This isn't meant to criticize her; I just find it interesting how different opinions people can have about crafts. (Not to mention how one's personal opinions can change over time!) Also, I'm sure it makes a difference the book was first published in the 50s.


Speaking of shawls, at long last I have started a project using wonderful laceweight wool Kerry gave me last year. I've found inspiration in a fabulous Estonian stitch dictionary, The Haapsalu Shawl by Reimann & Edasi.

Estonian-Australian shawl

Wedding shawl

Wedding shawl, a photo by Asplund on Flickr.

Here is a colleague of mine on her wedding day a couple of weeks ago (haven't found any matching wallpaper of curtains for her to pose next to) in the shawl I was honoured to make for her. The shawl is greener in reality, which you can see in this post.

I've started knitting a pattern from a book I bought some time ago, "Water Lily" from The Haapsalu Shawl by Reimann & Edasi. This is a pattern that actually doesn't have any nupps in it - but I like it anyway ;-)

"Water Lily" shawl in progress

In the book it is used in a rectangular design, but I thought it would work well in a triangular shape. This shawl will be V-shaped, though: I've divided the triangle in halves and am knitting the first half in a way to make it slant outwards from the middle. It will be similar to this shawl, which I made a couple of years ago.

Off the hook

Wedding shawl for Stina: corner & crocheted bind-off, a photo by Asplund on Flickr.

When I knitted the "Haruni" shawl recently I skipped the crocheted bind-off, but for this shawl ("Springtime" design by Marianne Kinzel) I kept it. I think it's a nice finishing touch, sort of turning the leaves into more flowerlike shapes. There seemed to be enough yarn left to add similar (but smaller) chains along the top edge to, and fortunately there was: when I had finished there was 5½ metre (6 yards) left. Three balls of Rowan kidsilk haze makes it weigh 75 grams.

A major advantage with all those crocheted chains is that it makes blocking a lot easier. As this shawls consists of three triangles I folded it in three to make the sections identical.

Regarding the sweater I wrote about in my previous post: Dan suggested a few rows of the darkest shade first and then a sleeve cap. I thought about that too, but there would be a disadvantage: the short-row wraps in the other shades would show rather clearly against the dark. (They don't show much wrapped around the stitches picked up around the armhole, but sort of get buried.) I appreciate your suggestion, though! :)

Till den här sjalen valde jag att behålla originalets virkade avmaskning: jag tycker att det är ett elegant sätt att förvandla bladen till mer blomlika former. Det var tillräckligt med garn kvar för att göra en liknande avslutning längs den övre kanten, men det var lite nervöst när jag hade kommit halvvägs. Det gick i alla fall vägen, och det med 5½ meters garnmarginal! Det gick åt tre nystan Rowan kidsilk haze, så den väger 75 gram.

En fördel med den här avslutningen är att det är lättare att sträcka sjalen när det finns en massa små öglor till nålarna, tycker jag. Eftersom den här sjalen består av tre trianglar vek jag den tredubbel för att få delarna identiska.

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