Playing with Silk: Rock Island.

Last December Hiro sent me a package full of delicious things... among those things there was a skein of 100% lace silk from Greta and the fibers (along with another skein of undyed alpaca).

The yarn is BEAUTIFUL and it is hand dyed! The color she sent me was a very bright red/pink almost fucsia (uff, it is so difficult to describe colors!!).

I had been so busy that I hadn't had the chance to put my hands on it and start a project until a few weeks ago when I decided that it was time to try to knit a shawl with silk.

Before I start knitting a shawl I usually have the inspiration coming from someone, usually a friend, to knit for. This time was different. I just wanted to try this wonderful yarn and I was also very curious to try the Rock Island pattern which seemed so different from all the triangular shawls that I had knitted so far. So, I made this without having someone who will get it as a present...

So, no more words for now...

Just blocked.

Details:

* Pattern: Rock Island by Jared Flood

* Yarn: 100% lace silk by Greta and the fibers (100g)

* Needles: 4.0mm

* Weight: 60g

Detail of all the sections.

Notes:

* This shawl was a challenge to my patience in many ways: trying a new yarn, some boring sections, some mistakes, some unravelling, etc.

* This was my first time knitting with 100% pure silk. It was a whole new experience. I must admit that it was a bit frustrating at first. The yarn is so slippery that it was very difficult to catch the stitches to knit them, especially if I had to make a K2Tog. I had to start the whole thing 5 times until I got the hang of it! So, there was a lot unravelling at the beginning.

* Then, when I was already done with several repeats of the first chart  I couldn't believe how ugly this was looking! It was HIDEOUS! While knitting most of the shawls I have done I could have more or less an idea of how it was looking... but with this one I was even getting a bit worried. I had to ask around to make sure that this would change later on with blocking (I must thank Franklin Habit and Marga from Greta and the fibers for the good advice and encouragement!)

The join where the stitches are picked up to begin the body of the shawl looks pretty neat.

* The pattern, oh the pattern: I have mixed feeling about it. It was very interesting to knit from the border and not from top down as all the triangles I have knitted and also for the fact that there is NO PURLING!! BUT it was terribly boring to knit that long, almost endless 71 repeats band of 12 stitches wide. I was really going nuts!

* I got a huge relieve when I finally picked up the stitches and began with the lace section (the Rock Island pattern). In general, I would say that the pattern is pretty simple and easy to memorize even though it is patterned on both sides. The lace section was knitted pretty quickly.

* Then, another tedious part! The garter stitch section was ENDLESS!! Very simple but extremely boring!

* Blocking was rather easy and YES! Silk blocks WONDERFULLY! It holds the shape so well! It is very light but at the same time it has a beautiful drape.

The shape is so nice and it drapes wonderfully.

* After I removed the pins I thought that the patience and perseverance did pay off: The shawl is really pretty but I think I should have made maybe 2 more repeats of the lace section so the garter stitch triangle would have been smaller.

* I am not sure I would knit this again... but if I do I will add those repeats I mentioned above to make it more "lacy".

A bit closer.

For now I will keep it for myself... too bad I can't wear it! hehe.

Folded and ready to be given :)

Making a matching greeting card and the next shawl

I was thinking about how to make a nice greeting card that would go together with the Harebell Fichu.

The first thing I knew was that the card HAD to have some knitting. Until now I had made cards using cross stitch and bobbin lace but never with a knitted piece.

I made the cross stitch motif based on a traditional Mapuche (native culture from the south of Chile) pattern called Pichikemenküe and külpe ñimin.

I have talked about this one before but I never mentioned it was meat to be a wedding greeting card :)

The color choice was really easy, I used the leftovers of the einband I had from the Fichu. So, the only thing left to think about was the pattern.

I went for a very simple Lilly of the Valley pattern. I really like the simplicity and beauty of the Lilly of the Valley. The amount of yarn and time I used to make this was minimum. In a blink of an eye I had a cute greeting card that matched perfectly the Fichu.

So, first is first: knit the piece. Then cut the paper and use some glue.

The card is very simple. 

The final result is far from being perfect but I guess that is part of the charm of handmade things. 

Now that the Aeolian is done it is time make a new shawl.  I must admit that after knitting the Aeolian (which turned out to be much more beautiful than what I was expecting) and making Eva's lopapeysa I was a little bit uninspired... It took me a while to find what to do next. I started to look at my books and Ravelry and nothing seemed to catch my attention!

Until I found the problem. I needed to have someone to knit for! Things are so much easy when you have someone to knit for... then it is possible to think about patterns and colors that the person you're knitting for might like.

So, I began thinking about what could be the best for her.

First I thought that blue would have been a good color option for her so I got some Einband in a very nice light blue. The color looked great on the ball but once I knitted a swatch my opinion changed completely!! I really didn't like it for a shawl. I thought it would look great for ababy blanket or so.

The pattern didn't convinced me either. I even made some mistakes on the swatch... shame on me!

I needed to find a better color. I went to the wool store again and this time I found the perfect color! It is a very, very nice light green. It looks very organic and natural.

The pattern I am making is taken from The Haapsalu Shawl book. It is leaves and nupps. What I like abput this pattern is the asymmetric position of the leaves and the movement it has bewteen each pattern repeat.  I also think that the color looks great in this pattern.

Leaves and nupps

I am planning to make an edge at the end that will be sewn to the body.

Now I am also starting to think about the next lopapeysa. On Ravelry there is a group called the Spanish Swap and we've been talking about making a Lopi KAL in September. I have already chosen the colors and today I was working on designing a pattern for the yoke using some ideas from the book Íslensk sjónabók.

More details about the lopapeysa soon!

I already have developed the films from my trip to the east. I will be sharing with you some of my favorite shots :)

This was one of my favourite spot. This is Mjóifjörður (The narrow fjord). The road was terrible but the place is a paradise.

One of MANY waterfalls everywhere.

In Mjóifjörður there used to be a whale station. At the beginning of the 20th century there were up to 200 people living there. Today there is not whale station and only 30 people live there.

Mjóifjörður. It was so quite. No wind and fog. 

A very decorated front yard in a cute little house in Eskifjörður.

On the way to Vopnafjörður there is a gravel road that is the highest road in Iceland. This is the view from that road of Héraðssandur. 

The cutest house in Borgarfjörður eystri. 

Well, that is all for now!

New book, Aolian progress and my lace super-pupil!

Tomorrow is Gummi's birthday and I was thiking about giving him an amazing icelandic book called Íslensk sjónabók (Ornaments and Patterns found in Iceland). I actually already bought it and gave it to him... I know! I couldn't wait until the actual birthday day! I am terrible!

Even the hard cover of the book is BEAUTIFUL!

This book is a compilation of patterns found in 17th to 19th century icelandic manuscripts. There are actually ten sjónabók manuscripts that have been preserved. The book contains all the patterns found in those manuscripts which have been redrawn digitally. It is a source of ideas with strong ties to Icelandic national heritage.

The book has 783 pages FULL of wonderful patterns that can be used for knitting, embroidery, cross stitch or whatever comes to your mind : ) It also comes with a CD! 

The book is a little bit pricey but it is worth every crown (króna). It is just WONDERFUL and the best of all... Gummi LOVED it!!

These are a few pages so you can see what I am talking about:

All the pages are arranged like this: to the left there are diagrams and to the right the drawings with color of the diagrams.

Some patterns could make beautiful wallpapers!

The Aeolian shawl is growing and growing. I have already started with the edge which is the main part of the whole shawl. At first I had decided to make the narrow edge version but finally I changed my mind and I am going for the full size version. I think it is going to look very, very good. I am very curious to see how it turns out!

This colors look so nice together! Don't you think?

The whole process of knitting this shawl has been pretty smooth. Except for a couple of SILLY mistakes I have made that have made me frog a couple of long eternal rows. The instructions are quite clear except for the set-up edge section which is made out of four charts:

- Right edge chart.
- Edge set-up chart.
- Center edge chart.
-Left edge chart.

The construction is as simple as:

* Knit the 2 or 3 stitched of the garter stitch tab.
* Begin with the right edge chart.
* Continue with the edge set-up chart repeating it as many times as necessary to get to the center stitch.
* Make the center edge chart once (between the stitch markers that are before and after the central stitch).
* Knit the edge set-up chart again as many times as necessary to get to the end of the row.
* Knit the right edge chart.
* Knit the 2 or 3 stitched of the garter stitch tab.

There IS something strange in the way this section is written in the pattern (at least I found it weird)... so I had to make up my own little instruction to get it right.

Today we were just at home, chilling out and Jóhann Birnir asked me, out of the blue, to teach him how to make bobbin lace. He is twelve years old and loves, loves, loooves handcrafts (and sports!). He is a great knitter himself!  Now, how could I possibly say no?!  IMPOSSIBLE!

Very concentrated.

Looking so PRO!

So, we started by loading the bobbins with some yellow, rather thick thread of linen. The first lesson: how to make a half stitch torchon ground. It was amazing how quicky he picked it up!! And how even the ground ended up! He made just a little piece because even though the thread looks really good it was kind of difficult to keep in the bobbins... somehow the knot that keeps the thread from running off the bobbins kept on running making it a little difficult to keep the bobbins in order. Anyways... Jóhann made a beautiful little first work!

Even and perfectly done!

I am so proud!! 

Odyssey

I love living in Iceland and everything that comes with that but I am not sure if I have said before that sometimes it can be pretty difficult to find some things here in here... so everytime that I am thinking about making something I have to cross my fingers and hope for the best to find all the materials I might eventually need.

Taken from Wikipedia

Sometimes (or most of the times) it is an odyssey that requires going to many stores spread all over the city with the hope of finding at least something similar to what is needed. Well, actually, most of the times I end up getting something that is not exactly what I wanted and somehow I have to manage to make it work as I want.

I can get very disappointed and grumpy sometimes because of this. I REALLY need to learn to control that... but it is so hard! I think that living in Iceland has made me become a more patient person... even though in the eyes of other (and especially Gummi) I am still very impatient!

Let's see. The last odyssey was finding thread for bobbin lace. I already mentioned little bit about this last time. When I was visiting Asturiasm where I bought my set of bobbins, I bought just one 500m skein of cotton n°20: big mistake... I should have bought A LOT more. I didn't think it would be so difficult and expensive to get some good thread here.

I began searching for threads and managed to go to four shops with very little success. In most of them they had only polyester thread or very, very fine cotton thread. Most of the people I talked with looked at me as I was speaking chinese when I was telling them that I wanted some cotton thread, something from n°20 to 70 to make lace.

Taken from the website of Heimilisiðnaðarfélag Íslands.

I checked the website of Heimilisiðnaðarfélag Ísland (The Society of hand and homecrafts of Iceland) and according to it they had all the materials for making bobbin lace, as I mentioned in the previous post, I went there and they actually had linen thread but the woman working there didn't know much about what I was talking about... strange because I thought they were supposed to know what they have to offer. They really don't have a big variety of materials so I ended up buying just one skein of linen (with no number... ) and some more "un-numbered" thread for a terribly huge price.

Linen.

More Linen

Last week I went to take a look at Storkurinn, a shop downtown in Reykjavík that sells mainly wool and also has a section with quilting materials. For my surprise they also had a lot of cotton thread in wonderful colors! But only n°30! Anyways... I bought a couple (and for a very nice price: only 560 ISK or 3.5 € each). As soon as I came home I tried them!

Cotton 30.

This is what it is looking like so far:

The beginning.

Slowly growing :)

I really like how the half stitch torchon looks like with the spiders in it. The first time I made cloth stitch I didn't like it at all but now I think it looks pretty cool (it is also maybe because I know how to make it better now :)

Have I ever said how much I love lopi? One of the many reasons why I love it so much is exactly what I have been writing about now: It is possible to find it EVERYWHERE. And I mean EVERYWHERE and at an amazing price!

And talking about lopi... I finished the Harebell Fichu! Well, it is almost, almost done! It is now blocking and I still have to seam the ends. It looks like this now:

Harebell Fichu: Blocking.

More pictures soon!

Now I need to think about what to knit now! I am little clueless... I will have to dive into the books and Ravelry to find some inspiration!