Experiments

My plant dye kettle is on again. I have an interesting plant dye experiments going on.

I am using local plants and time to repeat the experiments I started last summer. This recipe you can find in my upcoming book later in the future.

Secrets

At the moment I have started to finish my long-term craft project. It is going to be a piece of textile craft art. It will be shown in a craft expo in Salla, Finland this summer (July 2025). It is for sale (5000€ +  commission if the gallery takes one) but is looking for a accessible public place so it can also be donated if such a place can be found. It has special limitations and demands for the location it can be placed. It is a visible part of Forest Sámi culture. I am not in a hurry giving a new home to it so we will seek the new home for it in peace.

I am in the middle of another secret project too. I am investigating a special plant dye method. I will make an experiment and about that you will hear later in my upcoming book if it will be succeeded. It is not a secret anymore that I am writing a book: Forest Sámi Costume History And Present Days. 

WoolCakes

Here they are. 500g of hand spun arctic dog wool chinegora.

Variable quality, variable yarn. That makes it to look lively and unique which twists are different here and there but all balanced.

Most of it is white or light grey.

There is also darker grey.

There is also other natural shades. That all makes it actually a tweed yarn. I can't wait to start knitting the project. Unfortunately, I have many others going on, so this needs to wait...

SlowCraftWool

After our angora rabbits passed away 2018 we had one last delivery of wool to the mill and received for about 10 kg AAW. On that time Liinu moved in 4 years ago. Since that I still have -like always- collected our arctic dog wool. I started to spin it 2 years ago in May 2023. Now I have spun ~500g of 100% chiengora from our own dogs' wool. I do have spun everything else too but this has been my main and long term project. 

How much I have used the time to spin this yarn? I never counted. But, a skillful spinner spins 40-6o meters of yarn in an hour. This is not an easy yarn to spin so I have used much more time to get ~50 meters than an hour. I have not calculated yet but there might be approx. 200m in 100g. Normal wool of 500g would then have appeared in ~20 hours. This is not a normal long fiber wool. 😅

Today I finally reached the point where we slowly start to see all the shades of the wool. I have washed those 4 skeins now. I used only ~50 liters of water to wash 500g of wool. It is a small amount of water to wash the wool. I did it in home industrial hand-washing way so it was possible. This really is FashionNOW and eco-friendly wool.

I hung these 4 skeins to dry outside so for that I don't need electricity. Just the wind and a bit sunshine. It is +8 Celsius degrees outside at the moment. That is enough to get it dry. But, because the drying up takes time and the birds are building their nests I need to hang up also some scarecrows to prevent them to pick up any wool from these beautiful hand spun chiengora skeins!

What I am going to make of it? A vest for Him. A very warm vest.

The problem to solve was what to use because I don't want to scare the birds away from nesting in my arctic garden. I need the birds for my biological and ecological toxic free gardening. That's why I chose 2 wind chimes you can see in the previous picture and one crystal hanger. The birds are used to the sounds of my wind chimes but still don't go close to them. This crystal hanger has been hanging in my veranda so they have seen its reflected light outside. I just moved it 4 meters and placed it outside. 

I need to pay attention and see if they scare them enough but not too much. At this time of the year the birds appear to pick up the dog wool everywhere. We also leave it outside on purpose for them to use.

NB Mittens No2

Over a year ago I started to learn a new skill: needlebinding. I have now finished another pair of mittens. For these ones I used a stitch I think is called "Finnish stitch 1+2 F1 plaited" in English. I used Novita 7 veljestä "isoveli" (big brother) yarn (75% wool, 25% polyamide) (100g = 130m). These mittens weight 90g (!!!) so they are very thick and warm. To be honest this yarn was not the best possible for the needlebinding project. I didn't like its quality and outfit in needlebinded mittens despite I love it in woollen socks. 

What I have learnt -so far- in needlebinding? Well, many stitches of course. But I think the most important lesson has been that it is ancient and slow but a clever technique. It is not a miracle you can't see these on sale at artesan markets so often. And if you do, no wonder they are expensive. I have also learnt that if you want to make someone happy who really can understand and appreciate all the trouble and time you use in making needlebinding, then it will be an excellent gift for them. I paid only 3€ for the yarn on sale. These are for a man for the Yule 2025 who really can appreciate and cherish them. So, it is a low budget gift if we don't count all those hours I used making them!

GreySeals

Last week we had some special moments spotting Grey Seals just 1 km far away from home. Usually they don't come this close. Now we had south winds before the river floods broke the ice and pushed the ice floats away. That's why the south winds were able to push the remaining ice floats to the Gulf of Bothnia's north shores where the ice had already started to melt.

(C) Esa Sillanpää

We admired the seal pups which are surprisingly fast on the ice at this time of the year. Notice, the dogs must be in leash in Finland! No exceptions allowed on spring time! Not even for well behaving Go. In practical, many wild animals have their price. It you dear dog happens to kill one, you pay. For example a sparrow costs you 30€. And it is "just a small bird". These laws & rules are made to protect the nature. 

(C) Esa Sillanpää

The seals were just 500 meters far away from us. We used binoculars to see them. Even we had been able to walk closer we didn't. It is not ok. You should not disturb the nature life. That's why you can't see better pics of the seals in my blog. My father-in-law provided these pics to be published for you. His camera has better photographic objectives than mine. 

(C) Esa Sillanpää

We spotted 44-46 grey seals on different days. My father-in-law has always lived in this village. He was born 1950 and says the seals has never been this close to the shore. I guess it is because of the the impacts of the climate change and the poor ice situations during the last winter. 

(C) Esa Sillanpää

Neither have the commercial ice breaker tours stopped this close to our shore. Last winter they did. My father-in-law- spotted them when going by on his kick sled.

(C) Esa Sillanpää

Ice breaker tours are not very environmental friendly. The ships pollute quite a lot and this is just for the fun. You do can experience the ice in many other ways too and most of them pollute the fragile arctic nature so much less than these ice breaker tours. The ships also disturb the grey seals even they would not go close. The ship movement moves the water and ice quite far from the ship -not only close to it- , that makes the ice to be unstable and break even it is not the time yet, it shakes the ice and makes the seals feel unsecured so they need to escape.

Figures

I have been embroidering little samples for my upcoming tin thread embroidery course 24.5.2025 at my work Tornion kansalaisopisto community college. This is a traditional design. You can find it in Mona Callenberg's book Tennrådsbroderier.

This is my and my father-in-law design we've done together. This is a figure of a capercaillie (=wood grouse). It is one of the designs I have made for sale years ago when the digital photographing, not to mention smart phone photographing, was not discovered itself up here yet. But, if you have visit Lapland in late 1990's - early 2000 and bought a traditional style bag with a figure like this, it is designed by us and embroidered by me under the trademark E.I.S Design. The difference of this new wood grouse to the old one is that this new one has a glass bead eye, the vintage ones has tin thread embroidery eye. It is like a small line there where the eye is. No photographs to be published about those ones -sorry- but they are made of reindeer leather "sisna" handbags. I made about max 5 with wood grouse design. Can't remember exactly how many but for sure they are unique because this design was never before until now published anywhere else. I found it in my notes when seeking the designs to use for the upcoming course. I do have details about it where exactly these bags were sold, so from that you can recon the real vintage item. 😉

This is my own design from my new collection. It is not finished yet. I make these small samples on different fabrics with different tin threads so that the students will be able to see how different threads turn out in the figure.

Anttu'sLife

Isn't it amazing how life turns out sometimes? How you find the connection between the things/occasions/happenings at the end?

I designed this Sámi tin thread embroidery belt last autumn when we were waiting the autumn to frost the ground, cover the world by the snow and ice. It was a bit difficult to let it all come out for the design and decide which form this symbolic figure takes. Will there be starts, snow flakes or flowers? Will there be the snake or not. Will there be the holes between the worlds or not? 

It all progressed pretty slow during the winter, but suddenly when we turn to April I felt huge inner force to get it completed. I felt enormous inner force to complete this belt with powerful symbolic figures of noidi and travelling between the worlds successfully. 27.4.2025 I was just finishing the embroidery with the glass beads that drive the evil away and keep us all safe while they create the holes and make it possible for us to travel between the worlds. On that moment we received a phone call.

There was a dog in the ice in the bay. It means the waters have started to melt and get free from the ice cover. The ice cover is still there but it is weak and anyone can fall through. At the end there is a creature in the hole the broken ice has formed out. It is almost impossible to get out without help. So, now we got a phone call someone saw and heard there was a dog in the broken ice and asked us to go and see because it was on our side of the bay. I watched my spiritual belt and said "Keep us safe and let us travel between the worlds." Then I stood up and we hurried to the bay shore. We found the poor dog and got it up. Of course we called also 112 but had to act because it takes time to get help and we already had someone professional with us. 

The story has got its final happy end with one more scar in my body because of the sharp ice. This belt is Anttu's life. The praise for life and that spirit we all can find again even we had already given up. I saw from his eyes and cold stiffened body that he had given up already. I asked him: "I guess you are not going to give up yet, aren't you?" He kept on staring into the darkness and sigh: "There is no other way." I responded: "No, don't you give up yet, we do get you up if you just hang on one more moment, I promise, but you need to hang on, we will get you out." And that's how I was able to bring him back to the life. That's how we got up his body but also life & spirit.

For us all it is possible to try out again. Like Anttu, you can ask help. Receiving the help may feel eternity. Waiting for its arrival may feel horrible. But if you just cry out and ask for help, like Anttu did, someone will hear your miserable request and help you or get you help. Don't be afraid of to ask. And keep your eyes and heart open, there might be someone in the need of help. If you can't help, ask someone else. 

Love you all!

CoolMayDay

 

I have celebrated May Day before. It is not a surprise it can be cool up here in the north. This year, 1st time ever, I was over 700 km south from home to face this May Day weather. That was a surprise!

We spent the holidays with the kids and their families. We had lazy and relaxing moments. Last year our MayDay looked like this. 

Kirke looks like dead but believe me, she is not. She spends hours like this and if you lift her away she runs back. It must be relaxing. Just think how it stretches your back when hanging like that!

On our holidays in Turku we always walk a lot because of the dogs. We usually spot church yards (which are my favorite top ten) because Turku is almost 800 years old town and that's a lot in Finland.

The weather was not arctic all the time. We faced also beautiful -almost summer like- moments there. I love how they have built the play grounds there! They are park-like.

What amazes me most in Turku is that at least by Aurajoki river the wildlife is around. The birds nest in the parks and play grounds, rabbits dig their tunnels and I have never seen a fox that close anywhere else than in the city. The animals have lost half of their natural fear against the human in the city environment. That makes at least the Aurajoki riverside an excellent place to spot birds and other animals.

It would be wonderful to recon the bird nests by their figure, how they are built up. That is something I can't tell about the nature.

In Turku I found the heaven on earth for coeliac's gluten free life. I usually go another super market but this time I was introduced K-Citymarket Kupittaa by YoungLady. That means I had a guided tour around. I found many gluten free food products of which I have only dreamed about! The Citymarket is huge (from my perspective) so if you ever go there with a special diet, just make sure you have enough time! There are specialties from the big world but also something that is typical to Finland region kitchen.

Also, it was wonderful to come back home to find this "soljo" delivered to my GreenOldHouse. It is a traditional Sámi brooch about which symbolism and meaning you can read here. This is from goldsmith Tomi Mansikka's Aamunkoi collection. It is not sold anywhere yet. This is the 1st piece. Once I asked him could he make this design also as "soljo". And he did, and here is the result. Tomi works for Taigakoru which is my favorite jewellery trade mark in Finland. I am sure he will make some more if you like. :)