Monday, November 16, 2015

Frosty aftenoon

 I have many-many favorites from the 2015/2016 DROPS winter/fall collection. Also I have plans (and yarns) to knit some of them... Among others I have the original pink/mauve/beige colored Delight, but when in the fall I was looking for something I can wear with my red boots... I knew that some change is in the air...
 I think as for thicknes and gauge goes DROPS Delight, Alpaca and Fabel are interchangeables... 
As much as I love Drops Alpaca...it is really warm and have a tendency to felt at the uderarms (as I saw with my much loved Bergen cardigan). I wanted a fall cadigan, which is not as warm... So, instead of the unicolored alpaca I used the grey Delight with its changing shades, but where the Delight should be in the pattern I set free the soul of some unicolored red sockyarn that was in my stash... for who knows how long.
As for modifications... I added long ribbing to the cuffs (as usual) and added some extra stitches to the arms, as I have hmmm... not so thin forearms...
 That is about it, the pattern is rather easy, and straightforward (as far as DROPS patterns go--- I actually love this way of pattern writing, I feel they suppose, I KNOW what I do... at least when it comes to knitting that is.
Pattern is Frosty Morning from DROPS Design.
Yarn: Drops Deight and Fabel.
Needles: 2,5 mm and 3 mm.
Photos: Deli Christopher Laurent.... shot in a pretty cold fall afternoon.

Thursday, November 12, 2015

shetland

A shawl was knitted for a present...
The yarn waited for its fate in my stash for many years now, I received it in exchange for knitting. Then a few years ago, in one of my not so good periods (I didn't know back then that things could get worst. A lot worst...) I started to knit it as a meditation or prayer shawl...
I thought I will concentrate on a certain thing I wanted to achieve while knitting on this shawl... If I achieve that something with a help of somebody... then I will give it to that person.
This help could have been anything, a word said in the "right" place, a helping hand, a reference, whatever, but it did not came (at that time), and thingsturned for the worse...and then I just put away... later (years later) when someone really helped me, I made/gave her something else...
However, when a few months ago I did get an opportunity from someone I knew, that the time has come for this yarn... I frogged what was started from it, I didn't want knit into that sadness and struggle and negativity...I started anew, and fresh.
The pattern (Shetland Triangle) is an old favorite. The gift giving opportunity came suddenly, so we had no time to have a proper photoshot, I can only documen with the wek-pictures of blocking...

Monday, November 9, 2015

Camera fun- in other words... mama has fun with her hair.

When, in the summer we braided felted woolstrips into my hair, it was a great succes, however I didn't had many pictures of it, which, surprisingly Christopher minded the most
We repeated teh feat for teh fall's Wool-day, and as to Chris's request I let him make some picture of it :-)
 And while we are at it, I asnwer to the questions that are asked.
No, it is not (much) heavier than my hair would be, if it would be this long... The wool in it is about 200 gramms. First I dyed the naturally slightly yellowish wool to the lightest of grays to kind of match my haircolor. Then felted narrow strips, which were then decorated with bits of wool from teh fibers I dye. Some colored and metal beads were added here and there for more decoration.
 My friend, Tilda, sectioned my hair off to tiny strands, folded the woolstrips into half and braided it to the hairstrand. The ends are fixed with tiny white rubber bands. When I want to undue the thing I just cut the rubberbands and unbraid the strands.
 The first time it took about 3-3.5 hours, the second time she outdone herself, and finished it in two.
When my head gets sweaty, or dusty in the city, i give it a light shower. Felted wool is water resistant to a point, the trick is not to get the wool soaked, just lightly shower off. 
No, I do not go swimming when I have wool in my hair.
The first time I had them in for about a week, then the weather became way too hot, so I unbraided them... but I inmediately anted to have them back--- we got around doing them again in a few months... will see how long it will take me this time.

Monday, October 26, 2015

Forget me not... third time is the charm

Here is something (again) I've done earlier this year (in fact over late spring) then never blocked, much less doe photoes of...
I loved my forget me knot shawl so much, I thought I would love it in a different colorway...
In the blue/green Delight this time...
Wuth green beads of course (and added edging...just because I like scallopy edges on shawls.)
Pattern: DROPS Forget me knot
Yarn: DROPS Delight.
Hook: 4.0 mm
Photoes: Christopher Laurent Deli

Saturday, October 24, 2015

One year passed... in other words, gray, silver, white tones in my hair

Yet in other words, incredibly long ramblings about my hair, the how and why I changed it... I warned you. This is rather a journal note to myself, than anything else.
So a year passsed
That’s how long since I last dyed my hair.
If you look back, my blog showed pictures of me with a bright red hair, up until a few months ago… Many asked what happened, and why did I stop coloring… this “anniversary” is a good occasion to answer.
Aside from the crafty genes, from my family I inherited the “early graying” genes as well. My paternal grandmother (yes the one that taught me to knit and crochet), had a head full of white hair, by the time she was forty, and that I will follow her not only down the crafty path, but on this one, could be seen rather early.
I had gray hairs on my head, before I was 14, by the time I was 16 they were pretty noticeable, in my twenties my hair was salt and pepper…
I started to color it to a shade or another of red in my teens, and did the coloring for about thirthy and then some years. Originally it was dark brown, though, probably thanks to my mom’s genes (who was a real green eyed, red haired witch) always had a reddish shine. Who knows why, I always wanted to have curly red hair…I started with chestnut, mahogany colors, and as there were more white underneath the dye, I used lighter and lighter shade of red, until I got to the light coppery shade you are familiar from the blogpictures. Maintaining is was not easy, as it was white, at the same time it grew as fast like weeds. I always heard tales with a great envy from people going for five even six or more weeks without dyeing their hair… for me serious roots showed by the third week, and on the fourth one I didn’t liked to go out of my house. To tell you the truth, if I wanted to feel my hair in good shape I could have colored it in every other week, but that wouldn’t be good for my purse/hair or my health. Sometimes, when for some reason I went without haircolor for a longer period, I’ve seen that is whiter and whiter underneath, but I really didn’t know how it looks like, until…
Sometimes I thought I should let it go… often I thought when I will be 50, I will stop coloring it and become a sweet white haired old lady… in fact around 2010 I lost my patient and decided to go gray but then shit hit the fan, my life took a downturn… and I will try not to go in there just now…
However, from a few sentence you might now, that in the last few years I didn’t had it easy. I would say it was a rollercoaster, but it wasn’t even that as a rollercoaster have upturns, and I felt that whenever I feel I can’t get any lower, life took a turn for the worst saying, oh, sure, but it can.
Then, when my life to yet another downturn, I took a wow to myself, not to go to a hairdresser, and not have a haircut until I find a solution. I had no idea what that solution could be, or if there would be any solution at all, but no haircut until then. I could not give up coloring as I had to stay presentable… and there passed months, even years.
When finally it seemed that I not only managed to climb to the edge of that hole, I even managed to get a hold of that edge, in fact I could see a hope that I might even be able to climb OUT, my hair was waistlong. To be sure I waited another couple of months, no to scare my luck away. I enjoyed my long hair, the braided style that became mine, though I knew it needs a refreshing. Finally I had an appointment with my hairdresser, who done my hair for about twenty years.. I didn’t see her all too often, but sometimes she colored my hair, usually cut some of it off, sometimes put some weave into it… Such weaves I asked from her now. And I have no idea what happened, but as I left, the next day my hair started to feel like old elastic, then sticky like old plastic, and break off by the handful. Thinking back I believe that the many years of struggle and stress kicked my hormones out of balance, which affected not only my weight, but my hair as well, of which my hairdresser didn’t realized. I am not angry with her, I am not blaming her. She could have said that “look, let’s leave the perm out, and only cut a bit of it off”… we knew each other enough that I would have listen to her. Anyhow, in the following weeks, I have tried everything. Poured conditioners, masks, oils on it to no effect. Previously, when coloring my hair I often experienced that my hair felt much better right after a session.. In fact I often wondered why the heck I am so afraid of dyeing it more often…So in a last attempt on October 24th 2014, I dyed my hair… this was like pouring oil on fire, things got even worst. I even tried the scissor therapy, but every time I cut some of it, more broke off… and then I had to think…
I am not that far away from that magic number…
I am not going to get any younger…
Even if I dye my hair whoknows what color.
I do not have to appear at job interviews, what is more, I hardly ever have to go into a office…
Asslong Waistlong white hair can be as great as my red was…
If it was good enough for Jamie Lee Curtis, Meryl Streep, or Kate Moss…
If someone wanted me only for my red hair… well then I do not want them (be it a job, a friend, or a man..)
Of course the choice between having gray hair on my head, or no hair at all overwritten every other consideration.
Then I took a deep breath, like I did years ago, when I had to face the fact that without a degree I will not be able to get ahead, which ended me getting through some difficult time and clenching my teeth, but getting that degree..
This change might not took such struggle, but the same strong decision for sure. Even though at the time I had no idea what am I getting into. Naturally I looked around forums, blogs, read about such changes, watched videos on YouTube and had a whole board on Pinterest, so I kind of knew where to go from there…
One thing was sure, I will change my hairdresser. As much as I liked her as a person, I lost my trust, and also whenever I did mention letting my hair go gray she rejected the though. I asked my friends, and from their suggestions I found Éva… Poor girl didn’t know where will I take her, though later I found she kinda likes challenges, she likes to have to think about a task…

We decided to put silver, red and light brown highlights into my hair to soften the line between the colored and the gray part, and later put more and more silver and less and less color, until it is all silver and grown… In theory this was great, but as she put the lightening agent on my hair… with almost the same momentum she had to take it off, as my hair literally started to melt under it and she knew already that I do not like very short hair… especially on my head. Bald head I like even less. My waistlong hair was in ruins by then, first it had to be cut until my shoulder blades, then 
somewhere between my shoulder and ears…

 I only cried through the night… I missed the braid from it the very first day, if nothing else I braided the hair from my forehead back
We could see that hydrogen is no help, I was left with the cold turkey and the gunk stripe route… In the meanwhile I/we tried other solutions, lightening shampoos, chamomile, citric acid, to make the difference between the dyed and undyed part less noticeable shocking. 
Sometimes I had to sit on my hand not to take a package and pour over my hair…
Pulled back, pinned up, braided… whatever form, it was not a good view. For the day of wool in the spring I braided colorful wool dreds to hide the blowrange ends… and I think this day was a turning point. This was the first time I went out in public and said , hey this IS MY hair. This is not unkempt, it is gray on PURPOUSE.

A few weeks later the ends were light enough to try ash toner on it, and after a bigger cut I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. Summer swimming often made it look yellow, sometimes the toner turned to green, sometimes it was hard to see it is intentional, not just a fucked up messed up blonde . 

By this time I used shampoo and conditioner for gray hair…and for the Festival of folk arts I had wool dreds dyed to the lightest gray braided into it..
Today.. its been a year since I last put color on my hair. I am not the end of this journey, the ends still yellowish, bleached, ashened, shoulder length (instead of waist length), but I will get there.
Yes, I miss being a readhead. I miss being the dangerous, feisty, crazy carrot head with the lamp for her hair. Sometimes catching my reflection from the corner of my eyes I do not realize that “that white haired woman” is me. In pictures I still look for the red spot, when I search my face, but actually, less and less. When the magazine asked for a photo a few week ago I did not wanted a redheaded one… asked them to shot a new one with my silver hair.
No I do not miss having to buy, and mix haircolor every coupl of weeks, I do not miss messing up the bathroom, my towels, my pillows…
Not to mention that it turned out that the biggest hairtrend of 2015 is actually having gray/silver hair… at the end of the summer, in the fitness club, where I go to swim, a girl in her early twenties came ober and asked me what color I use to dye my hair… (genes honey, pure genes)
That’s about it. A few weeks ago I had coffee with a teacher of the university, I became friends with.. she is a few years younger than I am, and the last I saw her was in early/mid summer. I was surprised to see she is growing her gray out. She choose a different route by having her hair cut short. But she said I gave her the strength and encouragement to actually go through with it…  and there are others.
My wardrobe is changing, though I don’t exactly see where will it end up. My eyes, and skintone did not change, but some colors still have a different effect… Luckily, I never liked yellows (lemon, ochre, mustard, sun, whatever), orange on the other hand… In late spring I went to a meeting wearing a brown skirt and my Golden wheat sweater. Catching my reflection in a mirror of the shopping mall the café was in, I thought, who IS that yellow haired deadly pale skinned woman??? If my hair will grow, and the ends will be cut off, it might be different, but for the moment my so loved orangey, rusty colors will take a back seat. Strangely light reflects in a way that if I wear those my hair looks a lot more yellowish, than otherwise. Luckily I can still wear red, even the warmer shades, and I can get more close to the colder

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Funny cables

I already did the happydance about being part of the Hungarian version of Simply Crochet, and now the knitting version came out today. In teh first issue there was this really cute, funny cabled hat, about which I felt, its a part of my job to knit it.
The modell is simple, easy to knit, If anyone is just getting to know the tricks of cableknitting and looking for a project to practice I can heartily suggest this one...
You can see from the original magazine picture that this hat is not a thight one, and since I choose a yarn that is decidedly thicker than the one teh designer used, and did not do my homework (i.e: swatch), I can only blame myself for the first attempt failing, by being kind of too big... however only a short calculation and reknitting cured the problem... (Instead of 101 stitch start with 81, and knit 4 repeats of the cable pattern)
Now I am thinking how can I use the same cables to make a neckwarmer... from this soft and warm yarn...
Yarn Alpaca wool (100 gramm)
Fotó: Christopher Laurent Deli

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Nordic Summer

And now back to our (more or less) regular progamming, that for the moment, consist of knitting, crocheting, and a bit of spinning thrown in here and there just to convince the average spectator that I am really, really weird.
So knitting...let me show you something I made in the spring and never got around to show. Until now.

As I was working with the spring and suummer catalogs of DROPS this was the one that grabbed my attention and held it thightly. There are others, that I love and would or will knit once I have the time, but this is the one that I knew will get done, no matter what. This is the one I kept coming back and the one that is not brushed away with saying "no time", or "not yet" or something similar.
 Just as I knew that I do not want to knit it from the Baby Merino, a full wool sweater and summer is just not going well together in my mind. However, the Cotton Merino from Drops entrenched itself in my mind, I wanted to knit something with it ever since it came out, so I decided it is high time.
That it is a completely different gauge? Never mind, I can brave that out... right?
Thanks to the University , it went fast, as I knitted the boring stocking stitch part during classes...
I started with the numbers of the smallest size. For the sleeves, since I do not like 3/4 length sleeves, I started out with 5 repeats of the edge pattern, and then added enough rows to end up with a full length.
Pattern Nordic Summer from DROPS
Yarn: Cotton Merino from DROPS
Photoes: Christopher Laurent Deli

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

cause and effect

You've already knew the effect, my radio silence, but I can only talk about the (real) cause now.. Which is after such long time is not that things are going bad, and I am drowing my sorrows in silence, but
that I am am incredibly proud...
When a few months ago Ildikó, the editor in chief of the publisher of several craft magazin told me they bought the license of the Simply Crochet and Simply Knitting magazin and would I like to be part of it, it was all I could do not to ask back if there is sand in the Sahara, or do they sell Coca Cola in the US...
Its been long my dream that somehow I manage to combine the two things so dear to my heart, knitting/crocheting and translating... also bringing home the patterns that are, for language reasons unattainable for the hungarian knitters,
Translating the DROPS patterns was a giant step, but this was really the Icing on the cake.
I am so proud today, and thankful not only to the Universe, and Ildikó, but to all of those knitters and crocheters.. I couldn't do this without you.

Monday, October 5, 2015

Birthday V.2.

 Well, I kind of left it off with my friend havinga  birthday and cancelling some meeting, and then her getting some yarn as a birthday present, right?
 And then just to prove that cancelling meeting is NOT the way to get handspun yarn from me, I did the whole thing again
 Birthday friend, cancelled lunch date and therest :-)

About the same thickness (still pacticing spinning thicker than lacewright, and the colors selected especially for teh recepient,

Sunday, October 4, 2015

Life sign and othe stuff

A incredibly busy winter and sping was followed by an even busier summer... and I thought things can only get "lighter". NOT so. Yes I know, I usually say that I don't even have time to read, but this is much more serius... I rarely had time to eat. Anyhow, I am still alive, and will come back with stories (hopefully) and news, and pictures, and who knows what else...
Until then here is a pic to prove that even though not as much as I usually do, but thanks to some traintrips, and endless university classes I still knit... and despite the popular belief sometimes I do finish stuff. This much stuff is awaiting to get blocked and have some photoes taken.

Monday, July 20, 2015

Cancelled meeting, and its consequences...

What a does a knitter do when a "knitworthy" (that is determined along very strict rules, but more about that in a later post) family member, or friend has a birthday (or other presentgiving event) coming up... Of course, knit something, right? But what if that friend is a knitter herself... what is there what she can't make for herself??
If you are, beside being a knitter also a spinner the answe is of course, YARN, even if you have less time than it would think what color, not to mention actually spin the thing... But when said person cancells the meeting, you can say threateningly "well what can I do... But there will be consequences", but all the while happily grinning, because you know that insted of a table of chocolate there will be actual present next time...
Diving into the stash and coming up with something that suits the target person was not that difficult...
On the other hand spinning it thicker than the usual laceweight took more attention..
The result is a more or less fingering weight... I don't remember the exact length, but somewhere around 360-400 meters 2 ply, spun from 100 grams of south american wool, my own handdyed.

Sunday, July 19, 2015

Oh, so... where was I???

Hellóóóó??? Anybody here???
So many times I wow-ed to myself, now I will be good and blog regurarly... But then something always happens.... and teh more time goes, the more difficult to get back to teh blogging routine... I think this time I lost it around the Day of Wool, where, however fantastic it was (or maybe because of that) I had only a handful of pictures made...Though I really wanted to write a heartfelt report on the event, which was as usual amazing, Now, mainly not to let it go unreported, let me show the few pictures I have from the day...
I packed my table full..
But this time it was not enough, I had to find some other way to display the rovings and yarns...
Honoring the event I had a special hairstyle made up..in teh name of who does not have hair should spin some for herself. Though the execution was not as great as the idea itself, it was a great succes... I am afraid this was not the only time I braided dreds in my hair
There were pupils, and many interest on spindle spinning...
And in almost every time there is one person who for some reason stands out of the crowd... This year it was Judit, teh little sister of my knitter friend.