Brrrr

I have no idea what happened to November or where it did go, but tomorrow it’s December so I guess it passed by as I was sleeping or dreaming of warm places. It’s so cold that I’m spending the evenings tucked into so many layers of fleece and wool that I feel like a hibernating porcupine. And I’m knitting. Knitting little wool things to keep us warm for the next few weeks. My knitting fever comes and goes. Last time it was seen around here was 4 years ago when I was knitting baby blankets and baby clothes by the mile and 7 years ago when I knitted and crocheted no less than 10 shawls during a long fall season.

Grandson’s mittens always seem to get lost somewhere between where he is and where he was 2 minutes ago (which could be anywhere), so I’ve been knitting some thick scrap yarn mittens that no one can take home by mistake.
We don’t have any snow yet but a massive ice sculpture outside our house. Our water that is temporarily going through a hose on our lawn froze the other day despite the ever running water in our bathroom, and to prevent that happening again they cut a slit in the hose. The water spray freezes and builds up a giant modern sculpture – and an icy slip & slide for all the kids to enjoy.

A Timmy Quilt?

We have had a rather peaceful weekend here at the Mrs Moen household. Grandson got sick and had to be picked up in kindergarten on Friday morning, and except for a trip to the ER and an hour of grocery shopping, I have stayed indoors for 3 days. With such lovely company I don’t mind at all, it’s the worrying-by-night that’s exhausting. When he was 2 he got ill while we were at our cabin and I experienced the scariest hours of my life riding with an unconscious little boy in my arms to the local ER and an hour long ride in the back of an ambulance with sirens and blue lights to hospital. In hindsight I don’t think I have done a very good job on processing it because when he gets a high fever I get worried even though we take all the required precautions.

Anyway, he got all better by Sunday morning and we did a little painting, lots of building stuff, beading, puzzling and reading, all squeezed into a short day.

So, I have watched a lot of kiddie TV during the weekend with the British children’s TV show “Timmy time” as one of my favourites. It’s about a 3 year old lamb that goes to kindergarten with all his friends and does everything children do at that age. It’s sweet and so funny, fantastically well made with incredible colours and details. On the floor there’s this beautiful patched rug which I think could be made into a great Timmy Quilt. I picture a little circular pastel quilt on my coffee table, oh yes, that would look very nice indeed...

Thankful

(Dance in the rain, 2008)

Even though we’re not celebrating Thanksgiving in Norway, counting your blessings could be a great idea any day of the year, especially those days where nothing seems to go right.

I’m thankful for
My loved ones
Colours, glorious colours
Patience
Silence
Garlic dip
Woollen socks
Friday mornings
Homemade Christmas decorations
That even bad days come to an end

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you who celebrate this holyday and happy Friday to the rest of you; I’ll be spending the weekend with grandson hopefully making some Christmas decorations for his mom.

Finishing touches

I’m not even going to pretend I know the proper English knitting lingo, but here’s how the front of the finished woollen jacket looks. Remember the scary cutting in the front and for the sleeves? Well, the raw edges are now hidden behind this. I picked up stitches along the edge and knitted the thingie with the button holes, then I picked up the other side of the stitches and knitted a few rows in the other direction.I bet you believe me now about the no-knowledge-of-knitting-lingo.

Visiting Jæren Quiltelag

A week and a half ago I got to spend a dark and rainy Saturday with a lovely group of quilters from Jæren Quiltelag at Bryne. The project of the day was Mix & Match for Christmas and these ladies whipped up some wonderful projects.
As usual on any kind of quilting class there were stash and stuff everywhere and lots and lots of glorious colours. I must say getting to play with other people’s fabrics is quite enjoyable. I even got a hot lunch, a delicious Mexican soup prepared by one of the ladies. Yeah, brilliant day indeed!

Erosion Bundle Project, Take 8: Eroding still

My prayer flags are still hanging in our garden, getting more and more frayed and fragile as the months go by. They are still holding my prayers safely tucked between fabric and stitches though and I still love looking at them.

Nimble fingers, snuggly feet

Mixing the two strands of yarn in this post lead to these
3 finished pair of socks for grandson perfectly fitting his feet and warm and machine washable. Daughter has wished for some home knitted socks as well, so I’ve got to get more yarn (well, not really but, you know...).

Christmas on Earth, Day Six

Day Six, a little table topper with soft and bumpy snow on the roofs.
It feels like winter already.-)

Sew In #6

I spent Friday afternoon and evening working on a few projects for Friday Night Sew In. Usually Friday nights are not that productive so the Sew Ins do make a difference when I have the chance to participate, picking a few projects from my Treasure Box to finish for Finn’s New Years Eve's UFO Challenge to work on.

I always make samples for demonstrating at classes and sometimes they get stashed away, like the beginning of these charming Funky Fowl. Some of the pieces were ironed onto fabric, but most of them were drawn onto fusible webbing that had lost all the webbing and I sort of kind of recalled some of the fabrics I wanted to use. Now I have two pillows in the making and I’m in love with the funky ladies all over again.
Apparently I had a problem reading my own instructions so I cut one background too narrow and had to add little strips on the sides. I first tried adding them to the outer edges of the border but that did not look even half right so I unpicked them and switched everything around.

I also knitted the second sock of a pair of woolen socks for daughter so both her feet stay warm for the winter.
Not bad for a Friday afternoon and night considering the always enjoyable company of grandson who left at 15:30 and a celebratory dinner out with husband.

Napkin Challenge update

My out-of-comfort-zone Napkin Challenge place mats are only missing the binding and some little details. As interesting as it has been working with alien (you know, not from my world) fabrics, I’ll try again with something more colourful.

So, not wanting to make more nisses (gnome is called nisse here), I’m taking inspiration from this napkin for a new project. I’ll be using those cute little buttons from this post as berries.

Oh yes, much better! You’ll find a little tutorial for making these free form leaves here.

Christmas on Earth, Day Five

Day Five, the little table runner with pink houses for daughter.
I love pale pinks with dark blue, it’s so clean and crisp and wonderful and yet most of the pink fabrics I have ever owned have gone into projects for her. Note to myself: use more pinks.

New shapes

Playing with new shapes and pretty fabric combos.

Christmas on Earth, Day Four

Day Four, the not-so-traditional-colour way table cloth.
I wanted to show how the design works on non-Christmassy fabrics and chose this fun dotted turquoise. I don’t like to meander quilt table cloths, but as I made a little glitch in the preparations it was the best solution after all.

I love the flowery ribbon which is attached by machine.

The stitching makes all the difference, don’t you think?

Make a Table runner

Looking through some old photos I found a few of some table runners I made for a raffle at our guild a few years ago. My friend, Inger Marie, had one in oranges and we all loved it so much that we decided to make some for prizes.

I got totally bitten by the bug and made looohoots of them in different colour ways. They are super simple and makes lovely little presents, so I thought I might share them you as a free pattern. You’ll find the link here.

Now, where’s the rest of my 3” squares; I could use some presents for the holidays…

Christmas on Earth, giveaway winner

Thank you to all of you who entered the Christmas on Earth pattern giveaway!
Random.org has done its magic and congratulations to
May Britt who won the Norwegian version and
Nancy Sue who won the English version.

Congratulations to you both; and to the others – thank you for playing along!

And moving on to a little Sunday evening bragging; Rene’ left me a comment a while ago congratulating me on being published in Quilter’s Home. Huh? I had no idea what she was talking about as magazines take a while to get here. She kindly sent me a copy and now the magazine itself has arrived. Thanks to Jennifer Marsh from The Dream Rocket for submitting my "Comfort" quilt and for keeping me updated on where it’s exhibited. I would love to see one of those exhibitions by the way.

You can read more about The Dream Rocket here and have a virtual tour of some of the wonderful artwork here.