Grandma Maimu got her knitting needles ready, gathered up her balls of yarn and decided it was time to start teaching knitting. Bim watched the whole enterprise with some suspicion. As far as he was concerned, balls of yarn had an entirely different purpose from knitting socks and jumpers. “Bim, leave that yarn alone! We’re…
If a red flame were looking for a shape, this shawl would be it:Heartflame. A true piece of lace beauty that caresses both shoulders and heart. It is knitted from fine wool yarn, making it delicate as a feather and yet surprisingly warm. Its dimensions make it an easy companion: the top edge is150 cmand…
A little girl came up to me one day and asked what I was doing. I told her I was knitting something pretty for a lady. Then she asked, “But when are you going to make me a cardigan?” At first I was speechless, but I said that once I had finished the lady’s one,…
There is no getting away from it, the birthdays continue. Fortunately these are the last two in my family this year, my grandchildren. So the fingers have to keep moving. I went looking for an idea and once again landed on the Drops website. I found what I was looking for. I had already bought…
WAISTCOAT NUMBER ONE Poor as I am, I cannot afford to buy presents. But the children’s birthdays were coming up, so I decided to get my fingers moving and knit something. But what? For Christmas I made socks for all three of them, hats and neck warmers for the grandchildren, so what now? If I…
I wanted to make something, either for myself or as a gift. I had this lovely colourful yarn and a neck warmer caught my eye. I had never in my life knitted with needles thicker than 4 mm, and now 6 mm! At first they felt as if they barely fitted in my hands, and…
I’m writing this down while it is still fresh because I forget things terribly quickly. I really needed this pattern and the instructions were in Russian. I asked a Russian woman to translate them, but she only gasped and said she could not translate such specialised text into Estonian. So I copied bits from the…
I started knitting the cardigan from the neckline. I cast on 56 stitches and knitted 6 rows in garter stitch. On row 7 I began the leaf pattern. The pattern repeat on the first row is 4 stitches. Once the leaves were finished, I added the blue yarn. I knitted 3 stitches in pink and…
I still have supplies of homespun wool from the days when my mother kept sheep in the countryside and we used to take the wool to be exchanged for yarn. We dyed it ourselves, using all sorts of methods, including making it multicoloured simply by tying sections of the yarn. What remains now are mostly…
