OOW Mittens No1

I designed and knit mittens for myself. I used loose end yarn from my own design WaterGrassVest project. These mittens match well with the vest. I am knitting woollen gloves to wear under these mittens. It is going to be something extra warm for my hands for the next winter. I used our own OOW yarn. (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) (100g = 220m) This is not fast fashion. It is slow craft and FashionNOW.

WaterGrassVest OOW

Here it finally is. The result of our 1st ever KnitWithMe project. My own design, knit with you! And I had some pretty winter days with a bit of light to be able to make some pics for you. I call it WaterGrassVest because the shades and the structure reminds me about the grass growing under the water.

The texture is thick because of the knitting method and the structure it creates. That makes it to be a super warm, but not too much if indoors in a chilly building. It is made of our own plant dyed yarns OOW and AAW. OOW (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) (100g = 220m) and AAW (50% our own ethic produced arctic angora wool, 40% ethic produced FinnSheep wool, 10% nylon) (100g = 238m), they both include so much love and the attitude of FashionNOW. 

True slow craft. Really designed for the functional purposes. I wore the vest this week at the work and am more than satisfied with it. I really am going to make another vest for myself but with a different design of my own. Would you like to knit it with me in the future?

KnitWithMe No 1 E

After the neck & collar we knit the arm holes.

Pick up stitches on 4-5 knitting needles. I have 4 x 16 + 12. All together 76 stitches on both sides. Then knit 2, purl 2. Repeat at 5-7 rounds and cast off.

After knitting the arm holes you need to turn the vest inside out and weave the loose yarn ends there.

The arm hole ribs should be a bit tighter than the holes because then it prevents it to get loose and fit better under your winter jacket slim fit arms.

KnitWithMe No 1 D

 

Now we've knit all the way up to the shoulder lines. You need to pick up the stitches on the knitting needles to make it all a bit easier and  and more clear. At least if your yarn is fluffy like mine.

You need to make the kitchener stitch to connect together the front and back shoulder lines. It is not so difficult. Just remember always follow the rule: the needle goes first from the front side through the stitch and then from the back side. Always, front and back. 

Always. No matter are you "up or down". Front and back.

Finally it all seems like knit together. Here you get 3 rows with the color 1 because you end up with it on both front and back sides.

And there is your neck line.

Pick up stitches on 4 knitting needles. I have 21 at front, 25 at back and on both sides 13. All together 72 stitches. Then knit 2, purl 2. Repeat at least 5 rounds. Depending on it what kind of collar you would like to have. Tiny, turtle of full double polo. It is up to your personal needs. I made 15 rounds. 

See you again by the armpits!

KnitWithMe No1 C

Now you have knit with me all the way up from the armpits to the neck line. Still you need to be satisfied with the fake light weird shades of my OOW (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) (100g = 220m) and AAW (50% our own ethic produced arctic angora wool, 40% ethic produced FinnSheep wool, 10% nylon) (100g = 238m) yarns. The real plant dyed shades of the yarns you can see on this post.

You can see the back side of the vest is higher than the front side. My back side is one repeat higher than the front side. In my case I have total 180 stitches. It depends on your stitches how many you now had at front and at back. At the end you need to have exactly the same number of stitches on the shoulder line because later you stitch them together.

(The repeat means in this case one stripe figure stitched by the colors 2-4 plus the color 1 there in the between of each stripe. The repeat ends with the color 1.)

The shoulder line final number of stitches is 20 (or few more if your vest is bigger than mine) on the both sides. You need to decrease all the extra stitches by the neckline. At front I decreased at 1st 10 stitches on the both sides of the central stitch + the central stitch. It makes total 21 stitches. And then 4 more (on both sides) by the neckline during the next repeat. Knit one more repeat with these 20 stitches. Leave the stitches "on rest".

Notice: Make the first central decreases by the color 1 at back side's back side (= purl). This means you end up to knit at first the right side back shoulder (but it really doesn't matter). Then you knit the left side back shoulder.

Make sure your back side is one repeat higher than the front side. Because you have less rounds left to make the decrease to 20 stitches on both shoulders you need to make it faster. Which means more on the central line. You make the decrease during one repeat and then your're done with the back side.

Calculate how many stitches you have. At front you need to decrease so many stitches that you end up on both shoulders with 20 (the number you have left at the end at the front side shoulder) + 2. 

After decreasing the needed number of stitches at back's central point you need to decrease 2 more by the neck neck line.

Notice: Make the first central decreases by the color 1 at back side. This means you end up to knit at first the right side back shoulder. Then you knit the left side back shoulder. Leave the stitches "on rest".

Now you have got rid of your knitting needles, haven't you. 😊

For the next well meet to connect the shoulder lines!

KnitWithMe No1 A

I started a knitting project and had an idea that you could knit it with me. I designed a woollen vest which I am going to wear at work. My craft classroom, where I mostly teach, is big and high. It is a former gym hall! (Perfect place for crafting even bigger projects.) It is a community college building made of the stone right after the WW2 wars in Lapland, Finland. The 3rd winter me working there is about to begin. I do like wear turtle neck polo shirts and a woollen jumper over it. But teaching craft includes a lot of walking around the class room, kneeling down, lifting up etc. Sometimes a woollen jumper is too much but just a polo shirt too little. A poncho or a shawl is difficult but works if I do only office job. That's how I discovered I will make few woollen vests for myself. This is the 1st one. 

For the project I use our own yarns OOW (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) (100g = 220m) and AAW (50% our own ethic produced arctic angora wool, 40% ethic produced FinnSheep wool, 10% nylon) (100g = 238m). They are not available for sale but for your own project you can choose the yarns that are approximately 100g = 220-240m. If you want to make it FashionNOW but have no wool of your own, you can try to buy some local or organic wool. For this project you can use also all your loose end yarns. Anyway, if possible, use 100% natural fibres to avoid supporting oil industry and micro plastic. Also, wool is warmer than other fibers so it helps you to adjust your heating a degree or few lower. That reduces the need of the energy you need for the heating.

You need 60-80 cm long no 3 circular knitting needles (or no 2,5 if you knit loose, no 3,5-4 if you knit tight). I used 80 cm circular knitting needles on the begin but then swap to 60 cm. It's up to you, how you like it.

For the ribbing I use the OOW which I've plant dyed by lupin. 

For the stripes I use AAW which I've plant dyed by reed in 3 different shades.

This instruction is for the size M. If you need bigger, make more. If smaller, reduce. S=172, M=180, L=188 etc. There's 8 stitch gap between each size. No matter what you do, how many stitches you cast on, as long as the final number of the stitches is divisible by 4.

Cast on 180 stitches on your circular knitting needles. You close it up when you start the 1st round. Place the slip marker on the begin of the round.

Rounds 1-14: 2 knit - 2 purl (color 1)

Round 15: knit all (color 1)

Round 16-17: knit 3 - slip 1 (color 2)

Round 18: knit all (color 1)

Round 19-20: knit 3 - slip 1 (color 3)

Round 21: knit all (color 1)

Round 22-23: knit 3 - slip 1 (color 4)

Round 24: knit all (color 1)

Repeat the rounds 16-24 until the vest is long enough and you end up to your armpits. We will continue from there later. 😉

See the notes below.

Place the slip markers on both sides. Make sure it gets even right in the middle front. Meaning that I have 180 stitches. Half of it is 90. The middle front is between the stitches 45-46. In my size the pattern of the 4 stitches figure doesn't fit right in the middle.That's why I marked again the sides so that the back side of the vest gets a bit smaller so I can match the pattern repeat right in the middle front. If it is even one stitch skewed it will be noticed because it comes right under your face at the end. So make sure you match the middle front center there where you want. The front part of the vest can be a bit bigger than the back side. It really is up to one or few stitches so it doesn't matter much.

This is how it starts to look like. The slipped stitches will form out vertical rows. It is like Fair Isle knitting but much easier and faster.

I'll meet you by the armpits! See you!

SingleCable Headband No1

I designed and made this Aran Single Cable headband from the real true begin to the final end. It is a real FashionNOW product. Inspired by my Dublin journeys with very fashionable stripes in Aran knitiwear.

My friend used to have an arctic mix bred dog. She used to collect its loose hair for us to be used in our project where we collect arctic dog and Finn Sheep wool to get our own wool yarn OOW.

It has been a long term project because I have hand spun the last remaining wool of her dog whose last wool she gave me. She has no idea I have been making hand spun yarn for her made of 100% of her dear dog friend's wool. At the end, after finishing the spinning, I have plant dyed the yarn by mushrooms.

Then I figured out what on earth to do with it. I wanted to make something she can wear/use but something that will last. That's how I ended up making her SingleCable Headband No1. It is really thick because I made it double layered. It will warm her head and heart. She will receive this very soon as a birthday gift. 💝

Reds

Here we go! More pictures about summer 2025 plant dyes. These our own wool OOW yarns (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) are dyed by Surprise Webcap (Cortinarius semisanguineus). You can see three of them also here. 

These 4 have been plant dyed by Madder. Also for these I used OOW yarn (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool). You can see one more red OOW yarn dyed by madder here with blue yarn.

Here is one more OOW yarn dyed by madder. It looks brighter and it really is. It all depends also about it on which shade you plant dye.

Here you can see all 5 together. On the left side is OOW yarn with the original natural white shade. The other 4 are natural light grey-beige on their original shade. The difference is not big but visible and it is enough to make the difference on the result.

And here is our own yarn AAW (50% our own ethic produced arctic angora wool, 40% ethic produced FinnSheep wool, 10% nylon) (100g = 238m) dyed by madder. On the left side is the 1 st bath, in the middle is the 3rd bath and on the right side the 4th bath. (Yes, you are right, I missed the 2nd. It comes later. 😅) When you compare all the pics in this blog post you can notice the madder doesn't get attach to our AAW yarn as well as on to OOW yarn. It must be because of the angora wool and slight 10% add of nylon because roughly to say it is half lighter than the matching baths with OOW yarn. But is does't matter. It is good to know and these are cute too and will be used later...

WOW! What is this???!!! It is my own souvenir from Dublin, Ireland for me & myself! I learnt with my students that it is very difficult to find wool yarn that is manufactured in Ireland from Irish sheep! This is it! It is Ériu. Take a look! I bought some blue in my favorite shade. I bought also some white for my plant dyes. The upper one is the 2nd bath you missed in the previous pic 😃and the lower one is the 2nd bath of Surprise Webcap (Cortinarius semisanguineus). We'll see what these all will turn out!

Blues

I have fell in love with logwood. I have dyed with the logwood our lighter pale fog blue AAW (50% our own ethic produced arctic angora wool, 40% ethic produced FinnSheep wool, 10% nylon) (100g = 238m). I made 3 pics for you to show you how difficult and depending on many things it is to photograph the shades. This 1st pic shows too light shades, especially the left side yarn. The lightest shade is too light in this pic.

In this picture the left side yarn is too gloomy. I could say too dark, but it looks also gloomy compared to it what it is. The right side yarn is from the 1st bath and the rests one after another from left over baths.

This is better than the 2nd pic, but still it is not the right. The right shades are something between this and the 1st picture with the left side shade. The three other shades look more true in the 2nd pic. But it is difficult. And depends on also your screen resolutions etc. That's why it is easier to choose a pic you just like. 😂

I dyed also AAW snag grey shade with logwood. For these I used the left over dye bath. Again the shades in these pictures are not actual and true but close to it. I used leftover logwood dye bath to plant dye 800 g of snag grey AAW yarn to get blue-grey shade.

I didn't plan to do so but as a curious person and 1st time logwood user I wanted to see for how long the left over bath is usable in rationale way. The number is: 7 times! And if you use grey wool for the last baths you still get quite strong shades.

I used logwood also for the left side OOW yarn (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) in this picture. I made these for my mother-in-law. The red shade is dyed by the madder (Rubia tinctoria). More about the madder dyes later.

PlantDyes

So far I have plant dyed this summer for example these AAW (50% our own ethic produced arctic angora wool, 40% ethic produced FinnSheep wool, 10% nylon) (100g = 238m) and OOW yarns (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool).

From left to right

1. Yellow AAW (Birch leaves - Betula)

2. Coral AAW (Cinnamon Webcap - Cortinarius cinnamomeus)

3. Lavender AAW (the mystery one 😊)

4. Light beige (Fire Sponge - Phellinus igniarius)

5. Brown OOW (Alder Cones - Alnus)

The shades are beautiful and I already have something in my mind for them. Many many projects. In this pic you can see how they appear compared to white. But photographing the shades is so much up to the light and everything so you hardly never get the exact shade if being a hobbyist in photographing like me. 

I have plant dyed also by mushrooms. I used toxic Surprise Webcap (Cortinarius semisanguineus). Also this is one of my experiments for my upcoming book. I frozen and kept in the freezer for over the winter. Especially the caps remain well their ability to give red shades. The foot begins to give more brown than yellow after spending months in the freezer. These are OOW yarns.

NB Mittens No1

I made traditional style needlebinding mittens with a traditional style round start. I used Finnish stitch (2+2 F2). I used our old ethic produced dog wool OOW yarn (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool). 

This are for Him and custom made for His hands. I really enjoyed making them and practicing this new skill I've learnt in the past 12 months.

These mittens go with the needlebinding hat I finished a month ago. In these pics the mittens and hat look rather gray than brown. The real actual shade is something between.

Like the hat, these mittens are made with FashionNOW ideology. Also the mittens include an ancient method needlebinding. They are made of locally produced ethic wool. Manufacturing the mittens has not needed electricity.

NB Hat No1

A year ago I started to learn needlebinding which I have wanted to learn for a long time. He made me 3 moose bone binding needles. Past 12 months -every now and then- I've been practicing this ancient skill. Practicing has included also planned pauses. In my learning process these pauses have had the deeper meaning: to forget. And to be able to start again, to be able to jump back in when you have no idea what is going on. 

Today I have something to show you. It is a traditional style round start hat made with Finnish stitch (2+2 F2). I used our old ethic produced dog wool OOW (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) collection. This hat I started and finished last week when I was at a conference.

It is a brand new woolen hat. Despite it includes an ancient method needlebinding, it is made with FashionNOW ideology. It is made of locally produced ethic wool. Manufacturing the hat itself has not needed electricity or other energy except my needle and hands. 

More stripes

This pair of woollen socks is thank you gift from our dogs to a hunter who brought them moose bones this autumn. The base yarn is Novita's 7 Veljestä yarn (75 % wool, 25% polyamide) (100g = 200m). For the light shade stripes I used OOW (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool

ForHunter

It is Father's Day to come so I designed and knit a pair of long woollen socks for my father-in-law. He is a hunter and loves long woollen socks I knit for him every year: either for the Father's Day of Christmas. I usually knit easy designs which I can perform almost eyes closed to be able to concentrate on lectures or something else at the same time. 

What is special in these socks is the material. I used OOW (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool) for the legs of the socks. The stripes of the legs and the yarn for the other parts of the socks is Novita's 7 Veljestä yarn (75 % wool, 25% polyamide) (100g = 200m).

OOW WoollenSocks

I designed and knit a pair of woollen sock by using OOW yarn (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool). We have also hand dyed it by plants so I could include few stripes to decorate them. 

OOW SingleCable Socks

MyHouse is such a sock factory. Knitting socks for our love ones is such a traditional way of Finns to show their love & care.

This time I used our special OOW yarn (25% of arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool). It is very ethic and environmental friendly. It neither has any chemicals or dyeing so it is very gentle for your skin.

To decorate these socks I used SingleCables. It is a very simple and easy way to create some effect in one shade yarn. It is my own design.

OOW LappishStyleMittens

A pair of LappishStyleMittens made of OOW yarn (25% arctic dog wool and 75% Finnsheep wool).

My own design (yarn, stitches, colors etc.) but it is very clear that this is actually old TraditionalScandinavianDesign in natural white shades spiced with ChristmasRed.

WHITE ❤ RED

RED ❤ WHITE