Birkenwasser knits

Sateenkaaria ja serpentiiniä blog (in Finnish) is calling for small knitted items to a charity sale for Canelipuu ry. This non-profit organization is building a school in India, and they are raising funds for running the school. Sounds like a good cause, and as I recently released a new pattern, Helmipöllö, I wanted to use that. I found some yarn from my stash that's thinner than the original pattern calls for, so I decided to see if thinner yarn and smaller needles would make a children's version of the beanie and scarf.


The beanie turned out too small on my first try when strictly following the adult's size pattern, but adding one repeat of the cables was enough to make it fit. For the scarf I simply used all the yarn that I had left, and it's just enough to wrap twice around a little neck (134 cm).

I think the set looks good, and the feedback from the model was encouraging: "I like this big pom pom. Can I wear these after the photo shoot until daycare?". Actually, I'm so happy with the result that I'm offering the pattern for free for anyone who wants to use it for a charity project. If you'd like to get a copy of the pattern, click on the Facebook link at the bottom of the page, hit the Like button and leave a note with your Ravelry id (or e-mail address) and a link to the charity project that you want to use the pattern for. I'll send you the pattern through my Ravelry store.

Finnish handicrafts fair is a huge event. With more than 44 000 visitors and 650 exhibitors it's the number one event for handicrafters in Finland - and the largest of its kind in Europe. It was almost shocking to arrive at Tampere exhibition hall and see the filled parking lots and all the buses lined up. People gather from all over Finland to Tampere for this one weekend of handicrafts extravaganza.


To visit every exhibitor or even to walk by every booth would take more than one afternoon. That's why our sisters-team had a list of exhibitors that we wanted to visit and only took a look at the interesting stuff on the way. Even with this strategy we ended up spending the whole afternoon at the fair. Afternoon well spent, I would say. There were such pretty decorations and talented designers, crafters, jewelry makers - and yarn shops. One of the prettiest booths was Vihreä vyyhti with lovely color coded yarn selections on the wall.


I was a bit afraid that we would see empty tables on Sunday afternoon after the masses had flooded over the exhibition Friday and Saturday, but happily that was not the case. The only place that looked like shoppers had raided it was Novita's charity shawl wall and I was happy not to find all my four shawls hanging there. I hope the last one was sold during the afternoon!

The first shopping spot on my list was Tukuwool. 100% Finnish wool was something that I had wanted to try for some time already, and the pattern design is waiting for yarn on paper. Now I have the yarn for it as well!


We came by another 100% Finnish wool supplier, Riikka-Piikka, with lovely hand dyed colorways, and my sister knew what she wanted to knit with that. Akvarelli-Elli is going to become a vest and I'll stay tuned to hear more - and see more - of her experiences with the yarn. By the message I got late Sunday night, the yarn is already on the needles, so I won't have to wait for long.


It doesn't make any sense to travel 360 km to Tampere and back to buy yarn from a LYS that's located in downtown Helsinki, but it seems that I never get around to visit Snurre in Helsinki, so that was our next stop. From all the lovely yarns they had I chose a trio of Knitlob's lair's Tuulen tytär that will become a dress for Troll princess. I also found a beautiful colorway of Madelinetosh tosh merino light for a shawl design that's been taking form lately. And I got a lovely bag to carry my shoppings in! (You'll have to check my Instagram account to see the bag).


There's no visit to Tampere without visiting Kerä. Luckily they were also at the fair so I didn't have to run to their shop (which would have been closed on a Sunday anyway). This spring I bought some perfect silk yarn from Kerä, but unfortunately knit a pullover that turned out too big for me after blocking. Luckily, the other member of our sisters-team has the boobs for the pullover and the part of the fit that I was a bit disappointed with disappeared with a right-size model - it fits her perfectly! No need to worry about Christmas presents there, as she proposed that I would give the pullover to her for Christmas. Now the problem was that I want one for myself, but Kerä is out of stock with the silk yarn that I originally chose. Naturally, there were several other options at their exhibition stand, so all I had to do was to pick the yarn with the best colorways.  After seeing the lovely Rose and El Greco colorways of Madelinetosh DK I knew that they were exactly what I wanted. Especially, as it was an unusual choice of colors for me. Or so I thought - until I saw the names of the colorways and realized that they were the exact same colors I chose for my Exploration station...


With bags full of yarn we headed to the last must-visit booth: Titityy. This one was a bit more difficult. Not that they don't have all the lovely yarn in the world, but my shopping list was done and even if it might sometimes seem different, I do like to shop for yarn only if I know what I'm going to knit of it. It took some lingering and strolling around before we noticed a special fair price for BC Garn Colori and also spotted some lovely colors. And the next day I had a design on paper as well, so I know what these babies are going to become.


What a nice experience. Thank you for the invitation, Kädentaitomessut!

"Two of my favorite things are knitting and reading" starts the Yarn along post in Ginny's Small things blog. Well, you got me with that sentence, because what could be better than knitting and reading? Both at the same time, if possible, please.


I was running around the house to find my currents WIPs - knitting and reading - and realized that I have a pretty similar approach to both. You need to have the right book for the moment and the right knit for the occasion. It turns out that I can't really play the yarn along according to rules, as I have no idea how to choose *one* book and knitting for posting one pick. So I'm just going to show what I'm working on in no particular order. Except for the first one, as it's a novel by the very talented Laura Lehtola, nominated for the Helsingin Sanomat Literature Prize for a debut novel. I have only read half of it so far, but I can recommend it already! The knitting is going to be a cardigan for Business woman.


One of the reasons for having so many half-read books on my night stand is my fear of not having enough to read. That's why I always pick up a new book if I have to travel somewhere. Imagine the horror of being on a long haul flight and finishing your book before reaching your destination. What would you do for the rest of the flight then?! I started "NW" by Zadie Smith on my trip to Australia last year. It's not quite "On beauty", and it's in English, so I haven't gotten around to finish it. Now I know that some people prefer to read in the original language that the book was written in. For me, English is the language I use at work, so I want to relax and enjoy my novels translated into Finnish. The knitting is an experiment with my new Helmipöllö pattern: I wanted to see if using a thinner yarn and smaller needles would make a children's size for a charity project.


"Kohti" by Juha Itkonen is a victim of travel reading as well. I found the book on my parents' yacht and took it home with me to finish, but never did. The pullover-to-be is Robin by Helga Isager, knit with Isager Spinni.


"Signaali" by Pirkko Saisio is a book that was read at a knitting event at a library. I love these knitting evenings when you can relax and knit and someone reads short stories - or in this case the first chapter of a novel. I think that I might need someone to read the rest of the chapters to me, as the book has been waiting on my nightstand since April... The blanket is also a long-term project that stays on hold and then I knit a row or two if there's nothing else to knit. Usually there is.


While running around the house trying to locate my books I noticed that I can't find Katherine Pancol's "Muchachas" part two, which is not nice as it's not my book. I have signed up for a reading event about the trilogy and obviously there's no point in going if I haven't read the book. Good thing is that I haven't lost any knitting projects. Actually, I met a friend for lunch today, and she returned this cardigan project that I left at her house a couple of weeks ago. No hurry with that one, as the linen Sparrow is more of a summer knit anyway. The book by Kalle Kniivilä is called "Putin's people", it's about the silent majority in Russia: the people who support Putin. Why do they not want democracy? Really interesting read.


Another Putin book, this one Masha Gessen's "The Man Without a Face - The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin". Isager Spinni and Isager Alpaca1 are combined to make a Pine cardigan by Helga Isager.

Actually, the number of my WIPs is currently 11 and the book pile on my nightstand much higher than this, but as I enjoy knitting and reading so much more than taking pictures of them I'm going to leave it at this and go knit and read a bit.

The weather is getting colder and it's about time to start knitting for the winter. Helmipöllö (”Boreal owl”) beanie and scarf feature two different cables and a pompom. Knitting with bulky weight yarn makes this a quick set to knit. With forgiving bulky yarn, big needles and only two different large, fairly simple cables to knit, this hat looks harder than it is. Most rows are just simple knits with a few purls thrown in for interest, and only four rows of cable crosses in the whole hat. A great pattern to try your hand at cables. The pattern is both charted and abbreviated.

This pair of socks was cast on many many years ago. It was long before self-striping yarn, so the rainbow stripes are achieved by buying 6 balls of yarn in the colors of the rainbow. Naturally, the socks are knitted in the traditional way, from calves to toes using DPNs, a traditional 2x2 ribbing and basic enforced heel. Just the way my mother taught me 30 years ago. Following the traditional knitting choices, the yarn is also the most popular sock yarn available in Finland: Novita 7 veljestä. I don't remember why or for whom I started knitting these socks, but obviously lost interest and buried them deep in my sock yarn stash. As I'm not a big fan of sock knitting, they also stayed there for 10 years or even more. This fall the knitting for refugees charity project made me dig deep into my sock yarn stash and revealed one almost finished rainbow sock. So I decided to go ahead and finish this pair.


See-through rubber boots seem to have been the thing for Finnish sock knitters this summer. I didn't find transparent boots, but I found these ankle-length boots and thought that they would look good with colorful socks. Of course, this meant that I had to make the ribbing longer by adding some black ribbing below the colored stripes in order to show all the colors - meaning that I had to unravel most of the almost finished sock that I had found to begin with. But now I have the socks and boots for a colorful fall!