Tuesday, 30 March 2010

Almost a Sleeve

Last weekend I was at my own home, and it was wonderful. Not that I couldn’t have been luckier in my landladies family, but it’s not home. I had no idea how much I missed my own home till I came there on Friday evening. I would so much have wished to just stay at home and enjoy my solitude and familiar surroundings, but I was asked to work on both Friday and Saturday night. Sigh. Well, I needed the money, and it was nice to meet my colleagues again. I am grateful they still remember my existence.

My insane knitting project is progressing much faster than I’d have thought, the first sleeve is 38.5 cm (15 1/4“) long right now, well past my elbow. The picture was taken last Saturday, I’ve been doing some knitting since then. It’s still fun to do, luckily.

I made some stitch markers the other day to ease the work. I just need one when working on the sleeve, but for the back/front that will be knitted in the round, I’ll need six.



I only just discovered stitch markers the other week; I can’t believe I never thought of it myself! It’s such a simple way of marking where a row begins, or where the patterns on the front/back begins and ends. Without them I’m sure I’d mess up. I have done in former knitting projects, and have had to go back and re-do it.

I’ll be going home to my family in a couple of days for Easter, and I’d like to have my yellow kirtle finished by then (or at least be able to finish it while there), so I can ask one of my sisters to act as photographer. I’ll try to avoid the knitting tonight, and work on the eyelets on the kirtle instead.

Saturday, 20 March 2010

Progress!

First, my blog posts have behaved fishy again this week, but I think I sorted that out, in case you want to go back and read them.

Second, I've made some progress on three of my projects this week: the Gryffindor scarf now has seven pairs of golden stripes. It has had to give way to my spedetröja quite a bit, though. The first sleeve on the spedetröja is now 19,5 cm (almost 7 3/4") long. It's knitted in the round and has a wrist opening.


And, finally, my 14th century kirtle that has been a bit neglected lately. I've made 25 eyelets this week, only 22 to go :) They're sewn with waxed linen thread, like the rest of the kirtle, and the lace is made of very light brown woolen yarn.


I won't have much time for anything but school next week; I have several assignments to hand in which I haven't started on yet - I feel just a little bit of panic...

Tuesday, 16 March 2010

The Insane Knitting Project

For my birthday I wished for, and received, money to purchase a knitting-kit for a spedetröja to be worn with my folk costume. I was very well pleased, and ordered the kit the day after. Today it arrived!


The yarn is wool, and is knitted on needles 1,5 mm (US size 000, UK size 17). That is really tiny, but it’s fun, I like thin needles – the knitting turns out very nice as well. I started knitting at once, of course, and have now made about 1” on the first sleeve. The batteries in my camera died, so no picture of the knitting today. A little history on the spedetröja, then. A speda is a word in the local dialect of the county Skåne, meaning a splinter, or in this case, a knitting-needle. Tröja today means a knitted sweater, but in the past it usually meant a sewn piece of clothing. 18th century short jackets, for example were called tröjor. So, spedetröja just means a knitted sweater. Spedetröjor were knitted with relief patterns in purl-stitch on the shoulders, sides and bottom edge, and then felted. They where decorated (at least on the ones to be worn for representative purposes, like to church) with strips of silk and/or velvet at neck and wrists. Embroidery was also done at times. Red, green, blue and white seems to have been common in the part of Skåne I’m from. It was worn over the opplöt (blouse), and under the liv (bodice), like this:


This is an excellent example of an area where most people cheat with their costumes. The only people I’ve ever seen wearing the spedetröja with their folk costumes I’ve seen in books on how it should look. Most people don’t bother with it for. But I make historic clothing on a regular basis, and I want it to be right. Quite a few people make updated versions of spedetröjor though, to wear with modern clothes – I like that, giving historic clothing a new life in our time. On Ravelry you can find several examples of spedetröjor, made with the old techniques and decorations, but a little updated. Mine will be red, since the apron I plan to have made to wear with this costume will have red stripes in it. I think it’ll look pretty. Let me just say that this insane knitting project will truly take forever, so don't hold your breath

Monday, 15 March 2010

Who Wants to Live Forever?

Harry Potter the other day, and Twilight today – I’m a geek, I know (though, in my defence - Carlisle/Esme and Jasper/Alice are far more interesting in my opinion than I’m-eternally-damned-even-though-I’m-trying-to-be-good-Edward/I’m-not-worth-the-love-of-my-life-Bella). It might have something to do with my age - I just had my 27th birthday.

I got asked by a few of my friends what I thought about this, and all I could think of was that I’m rather 27 than 17 again, or 17 forever, like in the Twilight Saga…. imagine being an adolescent forever… so depressing! I like my present age… so, speaking of Twilight, this is what I might have looked like as a “vegetarian” vampire, frozen as an eternal 26-year old.



The picture was taken about a month ago - I photoshoped the colour of my eyes (my first time photoshopping, ever), but I am really that pale, and was so long before the Cullens made it interesting (as I’ve said before, the sun gives me headaches, so I usually stay in the shadows if I can).
The eyes look less yellow on the blog though... wonder why that is?

Even though I’m enjoying it, I wouldn’t like to stay this age forever. Aging is a natural part of life, and an educating experience I don’t want to miss, if I can avoid it. So I think I’d prefer my blue eyes with coming old age and death to vampire-gold eyes with eternal youth in this all but perfect world. My eternal life is there, but it lies beyond the grave in a better world. After all, I believe in resurrection :)


Oh, and New Moon is released on DVD here in Sweden at the end of the week - yay!

Saturday, 13 March 2010

Fabrics

A couple of days ago my Mum and I went to a fabric store to buy a few things for a project we were working on. We came away with some other things as well. They had a great sale, so I bought fabrics for a skirt and a couple of dresses. This is by far my favourite:

As soon as I saw it I knew that this would be made into a 1940s-style dress, and the first thing my Dad said when he saw it was that it looked WWII to him. It has a lovely drape, and it was so un-expensive I bought enough material for two dresses. I really like WWII-era dresses.

Monday, 8 March 2010

Gryffindor Scarf, part 1

Since it didn't work last time, I'm trying to post this again - better luck this time. I post it unchanged, and so all this applies to last Friday.


Inspired by my Medieval Gryffindor Embroidery, I decided to make a version of the Gryffindor scarf, as seen in the Harry Potter movies The Prisoner from Azcaban and onwards.



It’s not going to be an exact reproduction, but a good-enough version of it. The ones in the movies are knitted in the round, I think – at least that’s how the different patterns out there claims it should be done, and I think they’re right. However, that will need much more yarn than I can afford at the moment, so I’ll be content with a plainly, two needles, k1 p1, ribbed scarf. The colours and stripes will be close to the original though, and this will be knitted in 100% wool, not acrylic as many examples I’ve seen – acrylic is a ghastly material in my opinion. This will be a birthday present for one of my little sisters, a devout HP-fan. So far I’ve knitted a little beyond the third pair of golden stripes – I believe the scarves in the movies have 14 pairs.



I’m visiting my family for a week, so I have to be careful so that she doesn’t see it, only working on it after she’s gone to bed. I had planned to take pictures of it out in the snow yesterday, but just when I was going to arrange it my sister came home from school, and I had to run for it. And so, this picture is not as nice as I would wish.

Problems?

My Mum said that two of my posts had been mixed together (the Drawing-post and the Gryffindor Scarf, part 1-post), with the title of the one and the text and picture of the other - anyone else having this problem? It looks good on my computer, but not on hers.... No idea what the problem is, and so, I can't fix it. If It looks weird to you, it's not supposed to be that way... sorry.