The world according to MayaB

The baby sleepingbag is coming along. It’s very easy to knit so it goes quite fast, but it’s also boring cause there’s no challenge. As you can see on the pic I’ve finished the front piece, the shoulder stitches being put on holders waiting for me to finish the back piece, and then knit the two pieces together. Working with many large projects at the same time has put me in a new situation, I’ve actually run out of stitch holders, what a great excuse to go shopping! Unfortunately my LYS is closed on Mondays, but I’ll be there first thing on Tuesday and I guess I’ll be bringing more back home than stitch holders. In the meantime some short sircular needles will have to do.
I had some troubles with deciding my object for this week’s Exhibitionist, but I finaly got around to it. Since I’m living temporarely in another country I don’t have much of my old and dear objects around me, so there’s no nostalgia involved in my solution. But still, this is truly one of my most precious objects these days, especially considering knitting. I’ve used this to find patterns, to shop yarn, to learn new skills and techniques, to stay in touch with my forums at home, and I’ve also managed to get some new friend here in London using it. Of course I’m talking about my dear Mac!
Last but not least, I want to finish off with a quotation. The best one I’ve read for a long time, enjoy!

Jeg har kommet et stykke videre på kjøreposen, og forstykket er ferdig. Det går ganske greit unna og det er veldig enkel strikking, men også kjedelig siden det ikke tilbyr noen utfordringer. Gleder meg til å bli ferdig.
Jeg har endelig klar min løsning på Eksibisjonist: Macen min!
Med den har jeg funnet mønster, venner og garn, og jeg har lært meg nye teknikker. Jeg slutter ikke å bli forundret over alt det som “finnes” der ute! I dag prydes innlegget mitt med et sitat jeg kom over, nettopp ute på nettet, det er det beste sitatet jeg har lest på lenge, så sant som det er sagt!

I’m so pleased with the Exhibitionist, there are so many who have signed on, so I’m sure this will be fun! I’m not very happy with our button though. It was my first try, drawing the font myself instead of using a standard one, but I think I need to change it, so I’ll see if I get the time to do so before we officially start on Sunday. Some have asked me to explain the challenge more specific considering rules and the assignments. First thing first, there are no rules, this is just for fun, and you choose yourself if you want to join in every week or just a few times. The purpose of the challenge is to inspire, have fun, and maybe to learn something new as well. Every Sunday I will send out an e-mail and the assignment will be something like: What is the most precious knitting/crocheting equipment you own? Or, what is the weirdest equipment you have, which you find useful? If something is unclear and you have questions, feel free to ask. The participants are listed below. Anyone who want to sign on? Just leave a comment to this post.

We are starting a Sexy Summer KAL at the Norwegian forum DinHobby, and I’ve had quite a dilemma considering which project to choose. For a long time I’ve wanted to knit the Intolerable Cruelty which I consider to be a very sexy skirt, and I also found some beautyful dresses in the Holliday and Winter editions of Vouge Knitting (pictures below). Well actually it’s not a dilemma concerning choices, it’s more a question about being reasonable. Since I have so many large projects being worked on at the moment, I decided a whilde ago that I wouldn’t allow myself to start on a new big project before some of my WIPs are turned into FOs. And since I’ve allready bought the yarn for the Purple Perfectica and included that in my WIPs the answer is quite clear. I can not buy more yarn!!! So I’m knitting the purple dress in the Sexy Summer KAL, starting the 15th of March. In the meantime I’ll be finishing the Babybag, and as you can see I’ve made some progress in the last few days.

THE EXHIBITIONISTS
Lillefix
Angela
Anne Elise
Marianne G
Ing-Marie
Felisi
Anette
Guri
Anne
Lise
Santori
Nicole
Frøken ij
Sylvia
Mel
Karine
Britta
Amylin

Jeg er så fornøyd med oppstarten av Eksibisjonist, det er jo mange påmeldte allerede. Noen har spurt meg om å klargjøre litt mer hva denne utfordringen går ut på, spesielt i forhold til regler og selve oppgavene. Det er ingen regler, poenget er å ha det artig, inspirere og kanskje lære noe nytt. Om du vil være med på alle oppgavene eller bare deltar på noen av dem, så er det helt opp til deg selv. Hver søndag sender jeg ut en mail med ukens oppgave, den vil være noe sånt som: Hvilket utstyr har du som betyr mest for deg? Eller, Hva er den rareste strikketingen du har, og som du faktisk bruker? Dette blir spennende, jeg gleder meg til å se hva dere kan få ut av oppgavene. Og hvis du har lyst til å bli med, så er det bare å legge igjen en kommentar på dette innlegget så skal jeg få satt deg opp på lista.

Vi er i ferd med å sette opp en Sexy Sommer KAL på DinHobby og jeg har hatt problemer med å bestemme meg for hvilket prosjekt jeg skal delta med. Jeg har lenge hatt lyst til å lage dette skjørtet, men så har jeg også funnet noen kjoler i Holliday og Winter utgaven av Vouge Knitting (bilder over) som jeg syns er veldig flotte. Men egentlig gir svaret seg selv, jeg har jo gitt meg selv forbud mot å starte på noe nytt, før jeg har fått gjort ferdig noen av de prosjektene jeg holder på med. Og siden jeg allerede har kjøpt garnet til den lilla kjolen, så er jo den strengt tatt et prosjekt som jeg holder på med. Så mitt prosjekt for denne alongen blir Purple Perfectica, så får den andre kjolen og skjørtet vente enda en stund. Oppstarten for Sexy Sommer er 15 mars, og fram til da skal jeg få gjort ferdig kjøreposen som jeg holder på med, og som dere ser på bildet så har jeg fått gjort litt siden sist.

I received the February Secret Gift, two skeins of mohair in bright colors (the picture doesn’t give credit to the colors at all), and a tiny box containing stitchmarkers. Guessing who gave me the present wasn’t that hard this time, it was written on the envelope. So, thank you so much for the present Hege.

Yesterday was truly a day spent in the light of the knitting spirit. First of all I went shopping! I took a cab to my LYS, Loop in London. I bought the yarn I was planning to, and then I waited for the cab to come and pick me up. Since the wait lasted for ages, I managed to spend even more money. I bought some magazines as well, two Vouge Knitting, and my first Louisa Harding book: The Magical World According to Miss Millie, which is just beautyful and packed with lovely pattern suitable for my little angel. Those of you paying attention to my previous shopping might notice that I actually have bought one of the Vouges before. That’s true, I bought it last month, fell in love with one of the patterns (a purple dress), bought all the yarn I need for the dress while I was in Norway (spending about £90), and then lost the magazine. So there was nothing else to do but to buy it once more, and I was quite lucky, cause it was the only one they had left in the store.

The purple yarn in the picture is for that dress, the petrol blue is for yet another project. The Pinwheel is back in the closet waiting for me to start making the arms, and so is all the other projects…stuck in the closet. I’ve put them all on hold, because I have a much more important project on my sticks right now. Late January one of my closest friends gave birth to a beautyful babyboy. Of course I’ve been planning to make something for the baby during the whole pregnancy, but somehow I haven’t got around to it, and now that the baby is born I’m actually in a hurry. I want to make this, a baby sleeping bag.

After shopping I was off to attend my first Stitch’n’Bitch group. The Angelknits meet at the New Rose Pub every Tuesday, and I had a lovely time. Yesterday we were five women attending, but I’ve been told that at the most they actually had 25 people attending the group at once. I don’t get much out of the house these days with my crutches and broken leg, so this was such a great evening for me, and I really look forward to attend next Tuesday as well. So what was I knitting? The sleeping bag of course, you can see how far I got on the picture.

Jeg har fått gave fra min hemmelige venn på DinHobby
Friskt mohairgarn og maskemarkører. 1000-takk min hemmelige venn, som ikke er så hemmelig siden navnet sto på konvolutten, Hege!
I går var en dag i strikkingens ånd. Først dro jeg på shopping, dere ser på resultatet at det gikk noen lapper på den turen. Etter på var jeg på mitt første Stitch’n’Bitch treff, vi var fem damer som møttes for å strikke, slarve og drikke. Jeg oppdaget også at den puben der vi møtes har en fantastisk pizza bakt i stenovn. Jeg tror nok jeg kan bli vant til å tilbringe tirsdagskveldene der. Jeg begynte foresten på enda et nytt prosjekt, og har plassert alle andre prosjekt på hylla for en stund, dette haster det nemlig litt med å få ferdig. En av mine nærmeste venninner fikk en liten gutt i januar, og jeg skal strikke denne, og da er det jo et poeng og bli ferdig før gutten har vokst seg for stor til å bruke den. På bildet ser dere hvor langt jeg kom i går.

After having left the project far far back in the closet for a while, I finally picked it up again and finished the main part of the Pinwheel. This second time it turned out ok, it’s flat and not shaped like a bag at all. I’ve tried it on and the shape is like it’s suposed to. I’m still not sure whether I’ll keep the jacket for myself or give it away as a present, but I’m really pleased at the result so far. The original pattern is from Elann.com, and you can find it here. I’ve changed the pattern a bit considering the number of increased stitches, and I also chose to make a different edge which you can see on the detail picture below.

Etter å ha ligget bakerst inne i skapet en stund fikk jeg endelig plukket fram sirkeljakka igjen. Og etter et nytt forsøk så resultatet mye bedre ut. Se nå ligger den flatt, og fasongen blir derfor sånn som den skal. Jeg er ikke helt sikker på om dette ender opp som min type jakke, men i såfall så har jeg jo en kjempeflott jakke å gi bort, for det endelige resultatet tror jeg blir bra.

Finished with the Nemidress I ended up with just two larger projects to work with, the Pinwheel and the Seasweater. Now, the reasonable thing to do is to finish these as well before starting on something new, but am I reasonable? No, I don’t think so. I was very inspired by a post written by Lise on her blog about an old Norwegian technique, and of course I had to give it a try. The technique was originally called “weaveknit”, but from the sixties the name “basketknit” was used. Lise has made a good description of the technique here. It is in Norwegian, but if anyone want to give it a try let me know, and I will try to translate it for you. I’m also very interested to know if this is a spesific Norwegian technique or if it’s also known of in other countries. My project is a cardigan for me (I know, I’m very egoistic considering my projects these days), and the pictures show how far I’ve got and details of the technique.

Jeg var så fornøyd med å ha avslutta et stort prosjekt, Nemikjolen, og tenkte at de to andre store prosjektene mine nå skulle til pers. Men så ble jeg så inspirert av et innlegg på Lise sin blog om kurvstrikk, at jeg satte igang enda et prosjekt, nemlig en omslagsjakke til meg selv. Så da er jeg tilbake der jeg startet med intet mindre enn tre uferdige prosjekt på pinnene. Bildene viser hvor langt jeg har kommet, og detaljer for å vise frem teknikken. Lise gir en flott beskrivelse av kurvstrikk her.

For those of you who have been reading my old blog, this is an update on the projects so far. For the rest of you this is a presentation of the projects I’m curently working on.

For dere som har lest i den gamle bloggen min så er dette en oppdatering på pågående prosjekt, for dere andre så får dette gjelde som en introduksjon.
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The Pinwheel is coming along in it’s second version, and I’m hoping that this time I will get the hang of it.

Mitt andre forsøk på Pinwheel-jakka ser ut til å få et mer velykket resultat enn forige gang, så sakte men sikkert går det fremover.
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As you can see on the picture the Sea jumper also need some alterations. I must have made a huge miscalculation, cause the arms turned out way to wide. So the next step will be to unfasten the knitting, undo it and start over again with the arms.

Som dere kan se på bildet så har Havgenseren min også desperat behov for å endres på. Jeg må ha regnet fullstendig galt for armene endte opp altfor vide, så her er det bare å rekke opp og begynne på nytt igjen med armene.
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At least there is one project that will be done soon. The Nemi Dress is practically finished, I just have to do the edging, and there you’ll have it.

Det er i hvert fall et prosjekt som nærmer seg slutten, Nemikjolen mangler bare kanting så er den ferdig.