Becourse I´m worth it!

There´s been a flower festival this weekend and I got this

Blue cardigan

Things do get finished here! The blue cardigan in superwash wool bought at PR weekend in Kiel is finished. I tried out two new skills; I-cord for the belt carriers, fun and so easy and then I attached the arms using backstitches or what we called stemstitches. I always use a kind of ladder stitch and did so for the rest of the cardigan. The dress is an old favourite. It´s un OOP Burda. It was a white dress with a kind of balloon skirt and it only lasted one season. The fabric is silk and it was an UFO for maybee two years until my cousin was getting married. Then I decided it was time to hem it

Onion double wrap skirt

So this is my second item to the PR stash reduction contest. I think both fabrics are rayon ( that´s how stash works...) It´s my second skirt from this fabulous pattern! 5 yards of fabric

New kitchen curtains

I finally made new curtains for my kitchen! I used to have red curtains but after beeing curtainfree since easter I decided that I wanted something lighter and recalled the linenfabric in my stash. The curtains are my first items in the PR reviews stash contest.
The linen was not the heavy linen I recalled and I actually think it´s a blend of cotton and linen. I have some plans on making a blouse of the remaining fabric. Linen is such a nice fabric to wear, but you have to like ironing!

Wooltime

This is my leftover wool project. Got inspiration from a Vogue knitting. Take what you have and knit random. All my yarns has to be wool becourse I´m going to felt it a little and then make a wrap out of it....or something else.....someday or the next

Onion goes Odd Molly again

I added som lace, organza for the drawstring with pearls in the ends and used the iron a little.
Next time I will make the bodice a little longer, the sleeves narrower and I think I will add buttons in the front on the bodice. I have a plaid I bought at PR Kiel that I´m going to use. The fabric is a little heavier so it will be great for fall. This one will work this summer.

Farmers market

Kinder egg week

Do you know what a kinder egg is? It´s a hollow egg made of milkchocolate and then there´s a plastic toy inside. 3 wishes in one as the commercals tells us; something good, something fun and something else...??
Anyway, I finished 3 items this week; first the plaid blouse, then this knitted wrap used the same yarn ( my salary ) as in the shawl I showed earlier. I like it a lot and will now put it away until lets say hopefully october.
The third item is this top. It´s a BWF pattern plus size section that got a too long neckband
I took the easy way and inserted some plastic elastic like you use for lingerie
I think it was done in white with black seams in the magazine. The top is very nice. It has a nice hemline that lookes like it´s curved but is straight once you get the top on. 3/4 sleeve feels nice!

Onion goes Odd Molly

The other night I felt for sewing and was thinking of what fabric I should put the scissors into. When my inner voice said:"- you better finish something Karin! Since Odd Molly been such a huge brand here in Sweden we all urge for plaid little blouses and all the stores carry them in variations that differ a little from the original brand. I think it was in November that on of our chains called Lindex had to redraw one blouse becourse it was just copied into the embrodery and the little bow.
Well this is an Onion pattern, number 5018 in a quilters cotton, Debbie Mumm I think and with an FBA and no gathering at the end of the sleeves. Very easy to sew and is now waiting for me to iron it and put some lace perhaps in the drawstring necklace and I might add one or two embroiderys such as roses. A bow? No I don´t think so

Pineapple shawl

In the middle of this month I havn´t been buying any yarn or fabric for 6 months and I have plenty left to use...I allowed myself to start as many project as I likes and this is the latest addition. It´s a pineapple shawl croched in a weawers cotton- linen yarn. The result is so great! It´s soft and since Noa Noa charge you 500 crowns for a simular shawl it´s a real bargain and I´m having fun while doing it The pattern is from "Family Circle easy Crochet" All things are not so nice in that book but some are really great!

Queen Mudd shawl

I knitted this shawl for "Sticka" the swedish knitting guild. It´s designed by Queen_mudd and the pattern are sold by Sticka ( Sticka means "to knit") The pattern calles for Kauni but I used a really beatiful yarn from Ullcentrum on Öland ( the second largest island in Sweden ) I used 2 hanks of 100 grams and the salary was 2 hanks of the same yarn så now I have to think of something to do with MY yarn

Meet Anna Elisabeth

She´s my alter ego, my new fitting assistent ( I never had an old ) and she´s all dressed up but can´t go anywhere I bought her on Ebay for less than 1/3 of the original price

Paris Paris

June 19 here I come again. 3 nights a lot of walking and a good time. This time it has to be warm enoght to sit´on cafées and knit!

Spring cleaning

I saw that Annika has cleaned out her bookshelves and put her fabric stash there instead. I had two rather large built in closets from 1955 in my bedroom and the problem is that it´s hard to fill them up in a good way so I bought 3 closets ( Pax ) from IKEA and I have 2 guys who are doing the work for me ( they did a good job in my bathroom...) so these closets and sewingtable are in my livingroom: They will finish the work tomorrow, until then I can play with all the fun tools they left here....
I have an extra closet that I will put into my walk- in- closet and replace the old one in there that really doesn´t hold anything.

Fashionista

Fashionista is the book on everybody´s lips in Sweden right now. It´s written by Martina Bonnier who is senior fashion editor ( modechef ) at Sweden´s largest fashion magazine, there Susanne Ljung used to work too. The book will be published on thursday but the hounting has started. Martina likes clothes, she buy designer clothes and has 8 closets with these. She never buy copies of clothes and she looks at clothes as investments. She talks about basics and designer signature garments. She writes in the book that her family used to own Stilmönster that later has emerged with Neue Mode and together with Burda are our largerst patternmakers today. The Bonnier family owns a lot of things, it´s a well known name in this country. She is one of few who has access to all the fashionhouses and visit all the fashion shows. This girl knows fashion, she talkes about learning to appriciate the workmanship in these clothes and the importance of maintaining your clothes AND your shoes. She´s also beautiful and wears a size 34 that should be 8 maybe, so of course it´s OK to dislike her and be grateful that at least she´s not tall....
I´m gonna read this book! If you click on the link above you will go to a on-line- book store and there you will find a link so you can read the first chapter, or at least look at the photos.

Stil

Stil is the swedish word for Style. It´s also a radioprogram that airs on fridays and saturdays and if you miss it you can listen to it whenever or where ever you want if you click here. Stil is hosted by Susanne Ljung who is a journalist and has written books on fashion, beauty and Greece. I always envied everybody talking about project Runway, Sandra Betzina etc but not any more. This radio show is so good. Last show was about the color Blue. From fashion blues to blue and white china. The show is about every angle in style and design and there´s only one hint; It´s in swedish...

Karin-went-to-Kiel-wristlets

On PR-weekend in Kiel I dyed this yarn. Now I´ve knitted AND finished these wristlets. I used a pattern from drops for the picot edge and made some shortrows for making them bigger to fit my arms. They are a little longer than usual and looks good with a lot of colors not only turquoise.

You got mail!

It´s not often you got nice things in the mail. It´s usually bills and adds from stores on things I don´t want to buy or need.But last week I got a beautiful envelope with my name in Calligraphy. It was from Annika and included some seeds and two bracelets, one turquise and this lime green that I love!
Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!

I´m gonna take better pictures, I just learned that I should use what the camera is calling "shooting portraits in low light with flash" I´m a slow learner I almost have had the camera for two ( 2 ) years

Teal lace scarf

Something´s soaking in my new zink under inspektion of the all mighty
WOW it´s a new scarf!
The lace pattern was easy to knit from an incorrect chart and the shading of the yarn makes this scarf beautiful. The only problem is that scarfdays should be over by now...OK I whore it last night!

La Drougerie

I had a couple of hours between train and plain on my way home in Paris so I walked to Les Halles and Rue de jour that´s close. La Drougerie is a famous yarn, pearls and embellishment store in Paris. They have a second location at Au bon Marche that also sells other brands of yarns like Rowan. Photo from outside with th "no photo sign" in th center. They sell yarns in hanks in different fibercontents as cotton, wool, cashmere and mohair, you can see some of it in the picture
What is so fantasitiqe about this store is the way they knit rather simply garments and embellish them so fantastic in a rather simple way!
They have also "kits" for jewellery and it works this way:
You see something you like in one of their books and you tell the sales lady ( and there´s plenty of them) and instead of taking down a kit from a shelf she startes putting it together by picking pearls and whatever else from the jars on the shelfs.
Then you go to the "man in the booth" and pay for it. I always get a biblical feeling about him like he is there to decide over the dead and the living but he seams to be a nice man.
Even if you dont buy anything this is a store to druil over!
Just around the corner there´s a ribbon store, a famous japanese brand that is not called Macluba ( that´s an arabian dish) but something simular