Hey it's good to be back home again!

Look at this gloomy woman. Yes, she´s got fever and should be in bed, but she´s on her way to Norway and despite the heat she is wrapped in a Centipede scarf designed by Malin Flodin and the yarn is from Garnpaletten. Skeikampen was a good, quiet and beautiful place to recover in and after a day in bed I was out and about again.

I was afraid I should meet a bear but the only animals I came across were cows and sheep. Sometimes they came too close to my liking.

Here's the man who went on a walking tour in the mountains. This is what he looks like after seven hours of walking. Tired and pleased.

There was so much to see and photograph on our way down to the Geiranger fjord.

Time for a cappuccino in Lillehammer, wearing my new net-shawl.

We were met by a tremendous heat when we came back to Falkenberg, so I certainly don't need to put something warm around my shoulders but I want to show you........

.........a shawl in cotton. It should have been crocheted in mohair yarn and looks gorgeous in the book Sköna sjalar by Lena Blidell. My result is not so good and the shape is ugly.

........a shawl in wool, Heavens hand. Wow, that yarn is fabulous and the blue colour is so extremely beautiful! I'm rather pleased with the result. Anna's Shoulder Warmer will always remind me of Geiranger and mountains covered with snow.

Can't stop knitting and crocheting

I never need days off from knitting and crocheting. On our way to Norway I came down with fever and wasn't able to produce as much as I would have liked. I got well and finished crocheting my net-shawl. The yarn was a present from Carin. When I sat on the bench crocheting a man with two small sons were passing by and he said to his boys: - Now the Yes-bench has turned into the Knitting-bench!
Cute! He is excused that he didn't see that I was CROCHETING. I have already worn the shawl when visiting Lillehammer.

We drove a whole day to see the beautiful Geiranger and it was worth the while. I finished Anna's Shoulder Warmer.

When your husband stops at every corner to take pictures it's good to have a hobby!

A red buttercup

Last summer I noticed how some people knitted a top down design by Heidi Kirrmaier called Buttercup. I wanted to make it too and bought some cotton yarn. Well, I didn't start because I knitted a cardigan instead and the pattern and balls of yarn were hiding in some project bag. When spring was in the air I was reminded of the project and started knitting. It was very hard to see exactly how it would turn out as a finished item. At some point it looked enormous, at another point I didn't understand the pattern and put away the bag again.

Finally I pulled myself together and finished it. Well, there was a row I skipped altogether at the end: " On last round, m4 (m6, m4, m6, -, decr.2) evenly spread out ( gives you a multiple of 18) ".

Explanation anyone?

I like my new top and it fits perfectly!

Förra sommaren såg jag en massa människor som stickade en sommartop med namnet Buttercup. Jag gillade den starkt och inhandlade garn. Garn och mönster blev liggande i en påse och jag stickade en kofta istället. När det började våras kom projektpåsen fram igen. Från början var det svårt att se exakt hur stor toppen skulle bli och så förstod jag inte mönstret riktigt heller. Påsen åkte in i skåpet igen. När sommarlovet startat bestämde jag mig för att slutföra projektet. Det gjorde jag, men när jag var nästan i mål så förstod jag inte mönstret igen. Jag skippade helt enkelt ett varv. Det gick bra ändå, men jag vill gärna ha en förklaring av det förlorade varvet av någon. Toppen blev fin och lagom tycker jag.

Summer at last!

What could be better to start your holidays with than knitting with your friends? Ingegerd has crocheted this beautiful blanket with granny squares and she is thinking of making it even larger. I love it. It's a blues in blue.

Kicki has many shawls and they're all incredibly beautiful. She loves to compose with colours.

Carin is also extremely accomplished and as she is a crafts teacher she's started her holidays too.

She's making a cardigan of granny squares. I'm looking forward to see it on!

I got yarn and a pattern from Camilla to make a shawl with love knots. Love knots are not easy to make and I've tried and tried to read the pattern, but failed to understand how to make them.

Carin who is a very good pedagogue showed me and at first it looked just like a big tangle of yarn but after a while I could understand how it hung together. This is the result. There are blue tree pearls on the edging.

I've been in Granhammar with my husband, daughter and grandchildren. The studio was filled with the most wonderful yarn and I had a hard time deciding what to buy.

We didn't find all the animals we believed should be there, but we met Gustav the cat and we found some swings.

Sommarlovet började skönt med stickning och virkning i glada vänners lag. Ingegerd har virkat en underbar filt med mormorsrutor. Den är som en blues i blått. Hon funderar på att göra den ännu större. Kicki har gjort massor med underbara sjalar. Hon älskar att komponera ihop färger. Carin som är slöjdlärare gör otroligt fina saker. Just nu håller hon på med en mormorsrutekofta. Det blir spännande att se hur den blir. Den här gången lärde hon mig göra kärleksknutar. Först fattade jag inte hur trasslet hängde ihop, men efter ett tag gick det upp ett ljus. Jag fick ett sjalmönster av Camilla men lyckades inte klura ut hur man gör på egen hand. Nu är den blåa sjalen färdig och längst ut i kanten sitter blåa träpärlor.

Vi har varit med barn och barnbarn på utflykt till Granhammar. Det var rena garnhimlen i ateljén, så det var svårt att välja vad som skulle få följa med hem. Vi kunde inte se så många djur tyvärr men Katten Gustav hittade vi och gungor till dotterdottern.

Summer Holidays

At least for my pupils. I start on Wednesday next week. I've made a plain white linen shawl for summer use.

I hadn't expected 100 g to be such a big shawl.

It occurred to me that it was a long time since I had made any socks, so I had not had a chance to try my excellent sock blocker made of plexiglass by Carin. It worked wonderfully. Thank you Carin!

My happysocks are made of Regia sock yarn.

Äntligen sommarlov för mina elever! Jag börjar mitt lov i mitten av nästa vecka. Jag har stickat en enkel vit lin-sjal att använda i sommar. Av 100 g blev det en jättesjal. För ett tag sedan kom jag på att jag inte stickat några sockar på evigheter så jag har inte haft en chans att använda den utmärkta sock-blockaren som Carin har tillverkat i plexiglas. Den fungerade fint och sockan blev så slät och grann! Tack, Carin!

View from the top

Here's a view from the top of my house, on the balcony. I've knitted a shawl again, this time rather from a "recipe" than a pattern. It's the textured shawl by Orlane. The yarn came straight from the sheep and the smell of wool was strong. I like that!

Här står jag med min nya struktur-sjal på balkongen. Den är stickad av ett garn som nog kom direkt från fåret för ull-lukten var stark och härlig! Nu är den dock tvättad och blockad.

Lycky me!

I was so lucky in the Mixa & Matcha 4 swap to get Camilla from Örebro as my exchange buddy. She sent me a wonderful package full of goodies and she'd given it a lot of thought. There was a note-book and I love notebooks. This one is so summery- my favourite season. There was blue Faerytale-yarn to crochet a love-knot shawl. Blue is one of my favourite colours and I want to understand crochet-patterns better. Then you can see a ball of Regia sock-yarn in the British colours and I love Great Britain and English. Red is also my favourite colour and there were two light red skeins. They can be knit into a nice shawl. I was in great need of stitch markers and here they were - two blue little angels made by Ulrica Rymal. There was also some yummy chocolate and cardemom coffee. And Camilla - my husband loves knitted and chrocheted dish-cloths, so thank you! It was all spot-on!
It is Mother's day and Grandma's Day today and I suggested something to my daughter and here it is - my hexagon-bag.

There was a third package this weekend. I ordered something from Stickfrossa's new webshop. I liked the pattern on the fabric so much. I think it was a Kaffe Fassett fabric.

Last night I enjoyed some Swedish strawberries and a cup of coffee on my new front porch.

Vilken helg! Jag har fått tre paket. Ett av min bytes-kompis i Mixa & Matcha; Camilla i Örebro. Hon hade tänkt ut fantastiskt fina saker. Sen fick jag en hexagon-väska av min dotter i Mors Dags-present. Så hade jag själv beställt ett stick-fodral i Kaffe Fassett-tyg från Stickfrossas nya web-shop. Sist men inte minst så har jag smakat skånska jordgubbar sittandes på min nya lilla uteplats på framsidan.