Happy New Year!

Happy Spinning! May the light shine in on all of you!

For me the year 2012 ended in a wonderful way. The postwoman brought me a package:

Black, brown and white Finull from the Finullsheep's native country Sweden! All qualities are very nice, but the camera wanted only one close up taken in the grey light we have this time of the year:

Tack, Kristin!

Merry Christmas!

Bowl and stars made by Daniel Hjortman. Birch bark.

Hare

It's -20 C this evening. I'm thinking about all the animals that live in the wild. How do they survive? Yes, I know they are protected, but still I feel uncomfortable. I found undercoat from a hare in our garden in the spring a couple of years ago. It's warm. It's been used for mittens in Scandinavia in old times. The fibers are only about 2,5 cm long, but you can spin them into a soft, warm yarn on a supported spindle or with a long draw on a spinning wheel.

Two days to winter solstice

 

We have daylight 4 hours 41 minutes today. It's snowing. 

I'm spinning lavender blue and sun yellow.

New release Wadling/Silverbullit

New release from my son and friends tomorrow: Wadling and Silverbullit. My son Jukka in the centre of the photo.

Himmeli made from paper "straw"

I found this: Himmeli from paper straw tutorial. Wow! This a very good substitute for straw, and decorative too!

Himmeli, halmhimmel, straw heaven

We have a beautiful tradition in Finland: we make "heavens" from straw, preferably rye straw. If you search internet for "himmeli" or "olkihimmeli" you'll find lots of photos. I'll show himmelis made by Eija Koski, exhibited at Loftet in Vaasa. Eija Koski uses old traditions as a base for making new items from straw. The traditional himmeli was hanging from the ceiling in the old days, but you can still find them in Finnish houses especially in Christmas time.

I liked this himmeli made from Cow Parsley very much:

The fresh Cow Parsley has green stems. See how the color has changed from a deep green into a deep brown when the stems have dried!

If you want to use Cow Parsley you need to cut the stems while fresh, otherwise they'll split. Read about this beautiful wild flower here: Cow Parsley. In Finnish it's called "koiranputki", dog's pipe, and in Swedish "hundfloka" or "hundkäx", "dog's ?" or "dog's bisquit". On a warm and sunny afternoon when the hundfloka is flowering you can smell the fresh scent of a clean dog fur. It smells good!

Yarn vomit

"Nice yarn vomit", said Kristin on Ravelry when I showed the photo of my latest attampt to catch the yarn end from inside the ball.

See what she means? I have knitted since about 1955, and I still can't understand how you catch that yarn end.

Have a look at Kristin's awesome projects here: nitsirk

Walking astray on internet

Why is it that I can't stay on the road when reading texts on internet? I have been trying to read Jane's blog posts about Boreray for a couple of days. True to her exploring mind she has loads of relevant links, and true to my exploring mind I follow those links. And that's when I get lost and find myself somewhere I didn't intend to go, and suddenly half the day is spent reading various texts and I start getting worried about my spinning.

Now I'm going to give the Borerays a new try. They fascinate me, and Jane knows lots about them. And it's Saturday, which means I take it easy with my spinning.

Light

The sun doesn't rize very high in December. It stays up for about five hours now. Very often it's clowdy, like today when I'm writing this. When the sun shows it has beautiful effects on the landscape. Quite often you can see halos, like the one in my photo. Foxes keep their cubs under the old barn in summer. For a few moments the roof shines like a jewel in the fading light.

Wouldn't you like to go into the wood and see what's in there?