S-A-TUR-DAY KNIT!

Back to the ramblings already in progress...

The Saturday at the Nordic Knit conference (16 October 2010) dawned early for me. Woke at 3am again, but managed to overcome and get a bit more sleep in. Ah! Made all the difference in the world.

The commute was easy. Traffic was light. Erin and I stopped at a lovely bread shop on the way. Just as I was walking to the community center in which the class was held, I passed a very nice Paula who was rushing to class at the last minute because she hadn't brought her supplies and had to buy them. Oops. So I had to go inside to the vendors and I HAD to buy yarn AND A CROCHET HOOK. Can't believe I spent money on that, but thank you, Acorn Street Shop, for being there for me in my time of need.

I boogied back to the center and set up my business, ready to listen and learn.

Unfortunately today we were in a cold, unlit basement. And I dressed for an overheated room. I wore a long sleeve shirt and a beautiful Estonian shawl my dear cousin James brought back from the motherland LAST WEEK. Sigh. Nancy Bush was to give her keynote address that night, and it seemed ideal. But not for an unheated room in 50 degree weather. By the end of the day, I was wearing the shawl over my head and ensconced in a garage sale-d sweatshirt acquired during lunch.

Carol had a lovely presentation of Finnish "fur tape:" three ways to make it and pictures of application. We proceeded to make it. Then on to knit in loops. Three ways, too, I think. Such fun! I've never seen these things before, let alone made them or applied them. Finally, she had two new stitch techniques to share: wrapped purl and a gathered stitch. Wristwarmers were on display that utilized all these techniques, and the Knitter's Conference booklet for this year used some of them, I think. I cannot find it on the website, but that link will get you contact info. The last booklet, printed in 2007, took a couple years to sell out, I believe.

At lunch time, a wonderful lady named Paula took me to Archie McPhee's. Wow. An institution, I believe. I bought a rubber chicken, a rubber crow, a Jane Austen action figure (complete with quill!), lavender flavored mints. Hmmm... and several other stocking stuffers for the kids. We also hit a bead shop, as I had a beaded wristlet idea hit me over the head. Fun shop named Fusion Beads.



We bopped back to class in just enough time (for me to stop by a garage sale, buy two pairs of shoes and a sweatshirt). The after lunch fun was several other loop stitches and two stitch patterns: wrapped purl and a gathered stitch. Then Carol did a nice slideshow of her trip to Finland. I took notes, helped out by Scandanavian amphibians.




After class, I took advantage of the two hour break before the banquet to tour a major part of the museum. The wooden carvings were inspirational.





The Lappland items were wonderful. Reindeer fur, bright colors and curved toes. What more do you want?




There were also several textile things there. Here is an antique and an ancient spindle:




Here is a carding bench:




There was nalbinding. (Apologies! I do not know how to access alternative alphabets on this thing. There should be a small "o" above the a.)



There were Selbu mittens:





There was a beautifully embroidered mitten set. The pair next to these had a fabulous yarn ruff:





There was a lace making pillow:




And finally, some folk costumes. Check out the sleeves on this one:






The banquet will have to wait until tomorrow! No time left to transfer all these pictures. But just a quite notation: in real time, today I knit a Where's Waldo hat for my little guy. For Halloween, the youngest is Waldo, the middle is Wenda and the eldest is Wizard Whitebeard. Now just to make a wizard hat!

Cheers, all!