Knitting | Ever since I completed my first fair isle project a few weeks ago, I've been obsessed with colorwork. I finished all of my work in progress, and the only thing that I had left on my needles was my Strokkur sweater. The bottom part of the body is already finished, and I cast on for the first sleeve yesterday.

If you're not familiar with this pattern, it's a simple icelandic sweater that features a beautiful colorwork yoke. But there's also stockinette, and a lot of it I must say. When I cast on for the sleeves, I realized that I would have to work many rows before starting the fun part of the sweater. And i couldn't imagine myself knitting more stockinette without the prospect of adding a little bit of fair isle before the yoke. And that's what I did!

I played a bit with colors, placing one square of yellow here and two of grey there, and I ended up with a little chart that represents a very simple pattern that I would include on the bottom part of the sleeves. As you can see, there's nothing fancy about it. And I think that it will complement the sweater very well, without taking away too much from the yoke.

Reading | Little read in the city and Herbal recipes for vibrant health.

This week I'm joining Ginny's yarn along, to share my love for reading and knitting.

As soon as my Lopi yarn arrived, I decided to cast on the sweater that I had in mind. Even though I do not like to have several projects on my needles, I wasn't patient enough to finish my Keynote cardigan before casting something new on. And for my defense, I do not have that much work left on the latter. I've finished the body, and I'm now picking up stiches to start ribbing. So I do not feel too ovewelmed with what I'm currently working on.

The Strokkur sweater is coming along nicely. I just adore the rustic feeling of the yarn, and I cannot help but picture myself hiking somewhere on an island, up in the North, the sweater on my shoulders. I'm very looking forward to seeing how the colorwork is going to look. I'm pretty much obssessed with Fair Isle since I made my very first swatch for the Sheltand Wool Week Knit Along ( that is started in less than a month!).

Knit Along: A cardigan for the Fall

I’ve picked up a project that I have started a few months ago. The sweater was almost completed by the end of April but because the weather was started to hit up, I didn't want to work with merino wool on my lap. So I put it away for a few months, knowing that I will start working on it back in September.
I never thought that this time would come so quickly. It’s only mid-August but the temperatures cooled down so much over the past few weeks, that I have started wearing knitwear again. Don’t get wrong, I’m not complaining for a minute! My favourite months of the year are right around the corner, and that’s the perfect reason to start working with heavy wool again.

I don’t want to say that this cardigan is so far my favourite knit, because I tend to say that every time that I complete a cardigan. But the combination of the yarn (Gilliatt, 100% organic French merino wool) and the pattern is very nice.
I’m currently working on the second sleeve, which means that there’s only a few rows left to go! This garment is definitely going to get a lot of wear these next few weeks, but that’s what they’re made for, right? I just hope that won’t run out off yarn before the last row.

I'm not the only one to be addicted to yarn/ wool. These ladies are doing such an impressive job: Liesl has been dyeing all sorts of yarn using plants and veegies, Carolina has also been dyeing in her studio, far in Argentina and Sarah of the Yarn Trek podcast is always sharing the best eartly yarns ever.

Joining Ginny's knit along this week!

Yarn Along

Knitting/ Since reorganising my stash, and having beautiful yarn on display all the time, I started feeling the urge to cast something new. A few months back, Grace sent me the most wonderful package that contained some Quince & Company yarn.
Since the packaged arrived, I became some kind of "skein fetishist", keeping my "precious" yarn in my stash, with no plan to use it anytime soon. Before trying their yarn, I never really had a problem to cast on a project with a yarn that I had bought. I'm not a compulsive buyer, so when i have a project in mind, I just buy enough skeins to complete the project. Since I'm knitting "on a budget", I do not buy yarn without having an idea in mind, so there's no skeins sitting in my mini-stash for a very long time.
So I never had to face this kind of situation before. I knew that I didn't want to cast on socks - the yarn is far way too precious in my opinion, and I wasn't so sure about making a shawl either. But then after browing my favourites on Ravelry, I remembered this beautiful project that I could make.  And it's a shawl!
Over the past few days that I started knitting, the yarn has been flying on my needles. And before I could say "just one more row", I had already completed the stockinette section...

Reading/ The self-sufficiency issue of Extra-Curricular magazine. It has several interesting articles, including an interview with Rohan Anderson, soap making, slow fashion, and herbal medicine.

Watching/ Started to watch Bushcrafting (again), and planning to watch this documentary very soon.

*I'm joining Ginny's yarn along this week.

Yarn Along

Knitting/ I've been enjoying knitting my Keynote a lot lately. And I'm planning to work even more on it over this weekend: I'm going to spend some time in Lituania, eating homegrown food and relaxing.

Sewing/ The other day I found this lovely fabric in a charity shop and decided to turn it into a simple tote bag. The process has been very interesting but so long - since I don't own a sewing machine, I had to do everything my hand.  The fabric is quite light, so I make sure to not put anything too heavy inside -I only use it to bring the plants and flowers that I foraged outside and clothes from the thrift store. I found many lovely things lately, you can have a look in my Etsy shop!

*I'm joining Ginny's yarn along this week.

Ps: Don't forget to enter the Bluebirdlab giveaway!

Yarn Along

Knitting / Keynote I'm really enjoying this knit so far. For a long time I thought that I had made another mistake with the increasing, but I figured out that everything was fine eventually.
/Warble. I haven’t made that much progress since last time. I both love the yarn and the pattern, but I’m not convinced that the yarn will be soft enough for the person that I’ll be gifting it to. It’s always very challenging to buy yarn online because you will never really how it feels between your fingers. Therefore, I don’t really know if I should keep going or not.

Watching / Have you seen Lori’s last knit? Did you know that she’s going to Shetland in just a few weeks? Well, I got very inspired both by her trip and her last creation. So I (bought some yarn) started watching the BBC show Shetland. The landscape is so beautiful and whimsical. I also really like that the characters wear traditional knitwear, I even spotted a Kate Davies design!

*I'm joining Ginny's yarn along this week.