Birthday present / Þröstur and me / Álafoss

Two Fridays ago I was invited to a birthday party. My superdear friend Sif was going to celebrate her birthday. Last year I gave her a shoulderette that she really liked (luckily because I didn't know which were her favorite colors so I just chose one that I thought she could like... and that I really liked myself when I saw it hanging in my LYS).

Echo Flower. Yarn: Malabrigo lace.

This year, I didn't have enough time to prepare a present like a shawl or anything bigger so I had to think fast and come up with something quick because I think that hand made presents are always the best thing that one can receive. I had only two days to make something. So I went for a hand made pin (or brooch).

This time I didn't knit it. I used cross stitch and my favorite pattern: Houndstooth. It is a very quick, easy and good looking thing to make.

Then I attached it to a card and put it in an envelope.

Along with the brooch I gave her a book. I went to the University Bookstore where they have a little collection of books in spanish (yes, Sif speaks spanish BEAUTIFULLY!) and among those there were a few books from Chilean authors. I gave her one my favorite books: La amortajada, written by María Luisa Bombal.(I also found another of my favorites: Rimas y leyendas by Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, I HAVE to get it for myself!).

During the weekend I finally got some pictures taken of me wearing Þröstur. The days are getting shorter and shorter around here and one thing I like about that is that everytime that is not cloudy the short hours of light we have are beautiful. There is a certain softness in it that lightens everything up in the most beautiful way. Saturday was like that.

So we took a walk to the pond that is right behind our neighborhood (for those who don't know the place where I live is completely built on lava, there are not many trees but it is really pretty to walk around). It was so quite, almost no wind at all.

I also want to share a few pictures I took with the film camera that Judi generously sent me (along with other treasures). These pictures are from Álafoss, the place where Lopi is produced and sold.

It is a really nice place. Even though it is possible to buy lopi everywhere, even in the supermarket, I always choose to drive to Álafoss. And it is not only that the place is cool but the people working there is just adorable!

So, for all of you who have bought lopi... this is where it comes from :)

This is the building where the shop is.

There are several old buildings: the wool shop, some workshops, a café and the recording studio of Sigur Rós. 

Detail of the bridge over the little river. Everything is "stitch-related". Cute, isn't it?

Álafoss or Eel's waterfall

I have been going to buy lopi to Álafoss for almost three years and I had NEVER seen the waterfall until now!! How silly is that!

Have a great week!

A pin button and an experiment.

Two Sundays ago I was invited to a birthday party and there I saw a friend who had a really cute knitted pin button. I thought it was a brilliant idea.

The pin button she had a very simple. It was just a little piece of knitted fabric attached to a pin-back button.

I decided to try to do one and see how it worked.

So, the odyssey of finding the right elements began! Which in real was only one thing: blank pin-back buttons.

I went to four handcraft shops and didn't find any pin-back buttons. The most similar thing I found were there some kind of wooden buttons and pins that. But the problem was... how to attach the pin to the wooden buttons in order to have a nice and durable result. The answer was NAILS. I bought the smallest nails I found (10mm).

Wooden buttons, pins and nails.

In addition to these material I needed of course some scraps of yarn (from the stash) and needles.

The first thing I did was to nail the pins to the back of the buttons. Even though these were the smallest nails I found they were still too long so I cut them to make them just long enough to hold the pin firmly in place.

Then I knitted a piece in stockinette stitch to fit the button leaving a tail long enough to thread it all around the knitted piece and tug it to stretch the fabric on the button... and voilà!

The knitted piece stretched on the button.

Some details:

* Yarn: Araucanía Ranco Multi (It is so funny that I had never heard of these yarns in Chile. They are supposed to be chilean. In fact all the names (starting with Araucanía) are places in Chile!)

* Needles: 2.5mm

* I casted on 10 stitches. Purled all odd number rows and increased using kfb at the beginning and end of each knitting row (even numbers) until I had 16 st. Then began decreasing on every knitting row til I had 10 stitches again and casted off.

* I threaded the tail all around the border and tugged it.

The not-so-pretty back side of the button.

And now I have this on my bag, along with two other pins I really like:

My bag.

A little closer.

I am thinking about making a smaller one. My bag is not very big and the buttons is maybe way to big for it!

Last friday we went to visit Kristín Hrund, who is a master in dyeing wool, to get some help to have our own very first dyeing experience. We took some white einband, álsalt and vinsteinn (I don't know what they are called in english) and turmenic. Yes. We wanted to see how turmenic would work. It was such an amazing color... this kind of very earthy yellow.

So, the result was this:

We're still VERY thrilled about the result! It is a wonderful yellow tone! And it smells really nice as well!