Easter flowers and some knitting

Yesterday I was shopping for groceries for the holidays, and naturally had my latte at the café. I couldn't resist taking some photos of the florist's yellow flowers:

They had some Easter bunnies as well. I really like sitting in this café gathering my strength for the shopping and looking at the always changing flower arrangements.

This time of the year is too cold for anything to flower in the garden so we must let the professionals grow our Easter flowers. Time for daffodils in the garden will be late in May.

I have chosen the chemo cap campaign for Finnish Brown Owls' charity of the month. This is the first time I have heard of this campaign in Finland. (All these links are in Finnish only.)  I use baby yarns or cotton or bamboo yarns for the caps. Here are the results so far:

Two of these - only about 35 grams goes in one cap so I think I can knit a third one from the same ball if I make it slightly smaller. These caps are made for the summer or indoor use, just to cover the lost hair and make the person feel a little better.

The crocheted cap used almost one 100 g ball of yarn. There will not be enough for another one, even if I would knit it, so I will crochet a flower for decoration.

This pattern is fun and easy, so I'm making yet another one in brown shades. The patients can pick any cap they like, and I hope there is someone who likes brown colours as much as I do. The campaign started in Northern Finland and has spread all over the country. My caps will go to Helsinki, which is the closest chemotherapy hospital.

 

With these flowers I wish you all Happy Easter and happy spring!

Attached Strings and ancient UFO's

Finally my string block quilt is finished! Everything except the batting is from my stash, and please note that I was only digging in the blue box. I used very thick batting so machine quilting was out of the question. I decided to tie this one, and this is how it looks on the flannel backing:

The knots are tied with two shades of blue perlé thread (546 double surgeon's knots, to be precise).

My quilt ended up little oversized, but people are so tall nowadays so it may be a good thing.

 

Making string blocks was fun, and I have seen such lovely projects on other participants' blogs that I think I need to start a smaller string block project in the near future. Stephanie just recently told that there are over 150 finished projects already, and the deadline is at the end of June. Plenty of time to make something nice and fun.

Spring is really on the way here: On April 1st I saw the first finches, not just  one but a group of 10 boys. They normally feed on insects, but because of the snow and cold (not very cold any more) they were looking for the sunflower seeds and peanuts we give our winter birds.

 

Today it has been raining almost all day so there is much less snow left. Under the trees you can already see the ground. The lack of frost and the amount of light make me think of summer, and I wanted to start a summer project. Among many tempting alternatives I picked an UFO of the previous generations. I have told about this treasure here, but when I look closer I can see that there is more than half of the work still to do. The style and colourfullness make me think of dear Great Auntie Saima rather than my Grandmother or my Mother. What do you think of this:

 

The blue circle is finished, with thick perlé thread. The flowers and leaves are sewn with 6 strands of variegated embroidery floss. I finished a set of leaves and two flowers in one group yesterday and managed to make them look like the older ones. Here is a closer look to the edge:

   

(Blogger wants to tilt my pictures today!)

(I'm using the organizer from Anne Marie for this project to keep all the floss in one place)

The table cloth has been bought as a kit with no instructions but with some stitches here and there started so you can figure out what stitches to use and what colours. I need to find solid orange for the little flowers on the edge and the groups of dots in the circle. Other threads are still there. When the embroidery is finished, I will invite you all to the garden for tea and cake! 

VTT 11 - Spring Hats

Dear Ladies, it is finally April, and Easter is this weekend. Have you made or bought a new spring hat already? Here is some inspiration from my fashion magazines.

The coat pattern is also available. Or what about this one:

 

The next one is in colour, probably an advertisement so no pattern is available:

  

I would love to have her blouse any day! Here is the last hat. The magazine if from Feberuary 1st 1907, and you will need time to find the materials and make the hat before you can wear it.

 
I hope you enjoyed the fashion show and will be inspired to wear nice hats for spring. For me the warmer weather means I can forget about wearing anything on my head, but now I still have to live with the fact that without a beret I will catch cold or at least feel very uncomfortable.

This was my post for Vintage Thingies Thursday, hosted by Suzanne at Coloradolady. Go there and see what all the nice people have found in their cupboards, attics or thrift shops for this week. Happy Easter everyone!

Season's traditions, and Stash use report

On Sunday the tradition-mixing little witches were on the move again. I told you about this strange newish tradition last year here. It sounds like bringing American Halloween trick-or-treating (pointed witches' hats and outfits made in China seem to replace the more Finnish scarves, mother's aprons and cardigans) to old Finnish pagan times Western Finnish spring witchcraft  and to traditional Eastern Finnish Greek Orthodox Palm Sunday blessing of the members of the family and godparents. There the decorated pussy willow branches were blessed in the church on Saturday, given by the children on Palm Sunday to bless their nearest for the coming year, and kept by the icon until the eve of Holy Thursday, when they were burned. On Easter Sunday the children came to another visit, collecting their pay: an egg, decorated or not, or a coin.

Whether I like these little beggars or not, I prepared for their coming - and for Easter, of course. I changed the faded Erica heathers at the doors to "easter lilies":

And I bought chocolate eggs and other Easter chocolates:

By the afternoon the bowl was almost empty and my vase was full with decorated branches:

The children are supposed to come in the morning - the traditional blessing wiht branches was meant to be given to the person still in bed, as they always were members of the family or close friends. The neighbourhood kids started their rounds after 10.

Yesterday the sweetest little Easter witch arrived by mail:

My sister-in-law has designed and painted this cutie on thin plywood. On the reverse the witch is carrying her black cat under her other arm. She is flying on her broomstick in our kitchen window now, totally in peace with the two angels who guard my cookings every day.

On the crafty front I have been working on the string quilt. I decided to ty it, and that's what I was doing last night and will be doing tonight. The perlé thread is sewn in every corner and middle of the block and sides of the blocks, and I have sewn the binding in place, too, to avoid  getting the little bits of loose fibers all over me from the edges sof the fabrics and batting.

  My stash use this month was not as good as in February. I have used 1.5 m fabrics for the borders (double layer) and binding, 2.2 m flannel for the backing and about 30 cm for the doll's clothes. For the second panel of the wallhanging - nothing to show yet - I used 0.6 m of my fabrics, the grey I bought in February. That makes 4.6 m in total. 

I bought 0.4 m of quilting fabric I couldn't resist, and when I went to see a fabric shop in their new location in Järvenpää, I totally lost control and bought  30 cm pieces of 7 different fabrics, totalling 2.1 m. That makes 2.5 m in total. Still my stash was reduced by 2.1 m in March! I really should sew more. Like before, I don't count the fabrics coming in as donations or gifts. They only count when I use them! Does the small men's shirt bought at a thrifty shop count? I felt I needed it for a coming quilt, and it only cost 1 €.

Revealing secret projects

These two little girls have just arrived in their new homes abroad. They are the newest Unicef dolls I have made, Martha on the left and Dot on the right, and their new mothers are Suzie and Melanie. It is so funny we three have our birthdays within one week.

Both little girls have the Unicef logo in their leg seam, and they carry an identity card from Unicef. This means that two children somewhere in the world can have all vital vaccinations necessary to make a good start in life, provided by Unicef and paid by their adoption fee.

We had so much fun getting the girls ready for their trip! It was hard for me not to be able to show what was going on, but secrets are secrets. Dot used to sit on the windowsill with Raggedy Ann and Andy, watching our birds and squirrels. I think she made notes  for a new novel "The Squirrel Bandit and the Frightened Titmouse". I gave her a new notebook for the trip. She was running around in her blouse and knickers before I finished her skirt and cardigan, but Ann let her use their granny blanket to keep warm. Dot has still a slight fringe problem. Melanie will know how to help her with that.

 

Martha was more quiet, she was practicing her German by reading my children's books:

Martha has the same hair colour problem as Anne of green Gables, but I think it is just great. The young are so often unsatisfied with their looks, but when they grow older they will notice there is nothing wrong with their looks. I think Suzie will be supportive, and they can do girls' stuff together and leave the men in the family out.

I had made lovely pictures of Dot and Martha sitting on the sofa with Raggedy Ann and Andy, and hugging them goodbye, but I managed to delete them from (Mr. K's) camera before downloading them to the computer. You just have to take my word that the kids made such good friends, and I think they will be sending e-mails to each other.

VTT 10 - Very old pattern sheets and ivory rose

Just this week I was digging in my basement sewing room for some perlé thread for tying the string quilt I'm working on, and at the bottom of that box I found a treasure. Many many years ago my mother gave me a bunch of old pattern sheets and folders from 1895 to 1921. They are not all in very good condition:

The sewing instructions are very short compared to modern day sewing magazines. I noticed this, when I actually used one of these patterns. Why on earth? The schools have a big ball for the "new oldest class" when the graduating class leaves school to make their final exams. The students learn old ballroom dances and dress accordingly. My daughter Kaija was invited to this ball one year early as a dancing partner because the older yearclass had exeptionally a minority of girls. Kaija naturally asked me if I could make her that dress in only six weeks - usually the girls start planning what to wear months if not years before, rent the finest dresses or spend hundreds of euros to have a dress tailor made. Some girls make their own dresses, and some mothers sew dresses too. This is a picture of their dance. It is more like a performance for the other students, for the parents in the evening and for smaller pupils in other schools the next day.

    

 Sorry about to poor quality of the picture. I don't have a scanner so I had to take a picture of the picture.

I believe this was the pattern we mainly used, but ended up making many alterations.

Aren't these "the puffiest sleeves ever" in the picture below? (I'm watching Anne of Green Gables when I'm ironing.)

Here are some of our patterns, the sleeve in two parts:

We had to leave out the puffy part because the fabric was so heavy and this was difficult enough!

The skirts were usually very very wide, but I think our (we really did it together) pattern was in eight segments.

Do you want to see the result? Here she is, with a crocheted vintage evening pouch in her hand and wearing my ivory rose necklace. The skirt has a little tail and it looked great when she was spinning round dancing.

 

 I just happen to have a picture of the rose here:

 

The original ivory chain has broken so I have a golden chain instead. It belnged to Great Auntie Saima, like the lace handkerchiefs under it.

This was all for Vintage Thingies Thursday. Coloradolady Suzanne is hosting a long list of links to other vintage thingies. Thank you for coming!

 

Exhibitions in Helsinki

Last Wednesday I had a cultural day with my daughter in Helsinki. We went to see three exhibitions before I had my own programme and Kaija went shopping for some new jeans. Our first address was Design Forum, their exhibition celebrating the 130 years of Suomen Käsityön Ystävät (Friends of Finnish Handicraft) (The link's English version is at the moment under construction). You may remember that I have told about this organization in  some of my VTT posts and when I tried to explain the ryijy rugs. The exhibition was called YSTÄVÄT & ystävät - Friends and friends.

 

The work exhibited was made by contemporary handicraft artists as a tribute to the traditional skills.

Shadow of a piece constructed like a himmeli.

Textile surface on clocks and stools.

Modern embroidery. I didn't quite understand what this table setting was about.

A ryijy rug.

Our next address was not far, the Päivälehti Museum. There was a Moomin Exhibition, The Great Adventure, celebrating the publishing of the very first Moomin book 65 years ago. There were wall-size pictures from the picture books. This is my super favourite, "the book with holes", where Moomintroll is bringing home milk early in the morning but ends up looking for Little My. The blue part of the picture is in the book on the next page, the yellow path continues on the other side.
 

To cut the long story short, this is the second last page where they have survived all dangers and see the dear Moominmamma sitting in the garden and cleaning red currants. She is not asking any questions, just happy to see her son and his friends. The milk has gone sour, so there will be juice for everyone.

Kaija opened the door of the tall Moomin house in this picture:

This picture is from another picture book, Who Will Comfort Toffle?

The bat's eyes were holes!

 

I looked in first and then took a picture for you to see:

This is The Groke. I quote the Wikipedia text for those who don't care about links: "The novelist Alison Lurie has described the Groke, a black, hill-shaped creation with glowing eyes, as a walking manifestation of Nordic gloominess – everyone she touches dies, and the ground freezes everywhere she sits."

There were also originals of the Moomin cartoons, but they could not be photographed. We did listen to the sea in big sea shells like the children in the picture of my link. In the evening I gave Kaija the hole book I used to read to them when they were little. I still have my own from the 50's, and when there some day will be grandchildren, I will buy a new book to read to them. The holes could so easily be torn!

We also walked to the Amos Anderson Museum to see the Dutch mathematician M.C. Escher's Impossible Worlds. All my pictures were out of focus, so if you follow the link you will notice he is the guy who can draw water running uphill and fish turning into birds.

Spring report:

Snow was taken from the streetside so the streets and pavements will not be icy for too many weeks. The nights are cold but days are often sunny so the snow has started to thaw even with temperatures below freezing point. This is a great time to get a facial suntan, with the snow reflecting the sunlight. I will stay indoors sewing, as it is too cold to sit on the verandah at this time of the year. The icy streets don't tempt me for unnecessary walks.