Listening to this

So important with music in my life.....it needs to be there. Even more so these days.

Bumpy road

For the last 5 days, the road of life has been way too bumpy in our family.....

Sunday morning my father got a stroke - a cerebral thrombosis - and Thursday last week Christian's father had a heartattack.

Luckily things look a bit better today.

Days have been so stressful and full of anxiety......

So now I spend a quiet moment surfing the internet to get my thoughts to wander of to other places - if possible....

Girl's jacket for spring

Girl's jacket for spring, originally uploaded by lille-ursus.

For a long time I have known that this fabric was going to become a girl's jacket . I had found right the pattern. All I have been waiting for is spring....because a spring jacket it is!

Spring hasn't come for real, but it's getting there ( if you ignore the horrible storm today, which has broken my new greenhouse!!!!!!! )

I'm making the jacket in a size 4 - 5 years which is 110 - 116 cl. The fabric is a bit thick cotton - just perfect for spring and cold summer nights...

I adore all the many pastel colours and different motifs, which is in the fabric. I bought it in the USA.....So much wonderful fabric comes from that country.

I think the americans have a whole different way of using print on fabric, than we are used to here in Denmark. I have found a numerous amount of talented fabric designers - both in the USA and in England and other countries as well. ( I must not forget to mention Sweden too.......oh, how they know how to make dazzling fabric up there !!)

Overseas they really have a talent for combining good quality, lovely colours and fabulous design......

I know that I will definitely continue to get a great deal of parcels with fabrics from "overthere"...

Easter tablerunner for my bigsister's birthday

Easter tablerunner for my bigsister's birthday, originally uploaded by lille-ursus.

I made it just in time.....

Bird love

hartekip, originally uploaded by SuanaLea.

I could look at this wonderful bird forever....The lines, the colours, the shape, the expression, the text - all of it!

Some people simply have the abbility to create creatures, which have a spellbinding apperance - no matter which materials they use for their work.

This definitely goes for the Canadian artist Suana Verelst. She is an illustrator, graphic designer and toymaker.

The soft dolls she also makes, are just as amazing as her drawings. The dolls have a special touch of childhood, which really makes me smile and feel happy....

You can find her work in different places - here, here and here... I have allready seen her websites, but I feel the need to have another look!

I can only recommend you to have a good look a her lovely world!

This morning I heard the blackbirds sing for the first time this year. I love it when the birds' song wake me early, early in the morning...

( Elsker du også solsorten, kan du finde den fine illustration af Liselotte under overskudsdeling på http://www.slagtenhelligko.dk/ - helt gratis!!)

I'm sure the blackbirds chose today, because my dearest friend - my bigsister Lotte - turns 44 .

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LOTTE!

Click-clock...click-clock...click-clock

Click-clock, click-clock, click-clock, click-clock, click-clock, click-clock................

Yesterday I have been at my first table tennis meeting ever and the sound of 25 table tennis balls being ping-ponged at the same time, didn't leave my head untill this morning!!!!

Emil has started playing it this season, and he was rather excited about the meeting. He couldn't sleep the night before due to butterflies in his stomach. Poor little fellow....But luckily he had a lovely day.

As I wrote the other day, Liselotte went fabric hunting in Malmö. She brought me so many wonderful fabrics....and it even was a present from her to me!!!

Three different kinds - 2 of cotton with different shades of pink and green dots on brown and white. The red one was velvet with pale pink dots. They are all so beautiful and in my mind, I already see what I 'm going to make out of them...

Liselotte also gave something else for my family to enjoy - a big bag of candy from "Karamel Kungen". Uhhhmmmm!! (That's why I only can show you a picture of our candy bag - without contence.)

If you don't know that heavenly place, I can only request you to find one, the next time you go to Sweden. They have such amazing candy - a whole lot better than the stuff we get in Denmark!!

Finally I will give you a sneak peak at Anne-Sophie's dress. I'm really proud of all the effort and ideas of her's, which she has put into that dress....

Well, I'm off to have a look at the new issues of "Interweave Knits" and "Ikea Family" - both magazines just popped into our mail box!

Patience............ and precision

Patience and precision are two abilities which Anne-Sophie has been showing in sufficient quantities today.....

As I told earlier on, she is going in practical experience on Skals Håndarbejdsskole in week 9. That is one of the reasons why she wanted to sew a bit during the holiday.

That she likes it a lot as well, is another reason.

She found this model in a sewing magazine. A dress very similar to the ones women wore in the 1950ties. I know it will suit her well.

The fabric she chose was a light blue mixture of cotton and flax. Such a comfortable fabric for warm summer days.....oh, and the colour goes great with suntanned skin.

I'm very excited to see the dress when it's done......

Spring........from indoors

Sadly I have mostly experienced this wonderful, sunny day from the indoors....We spent the whole afternoon in hospital. Once again it was time for Emil to get his vaccination against allergy ( and to make his asthma better) . He is such a brave boy and never complains about getting all those nasty injections - but the fact that he has to sit still and not be physically active for the rest of the day, is really tiresome...Especially on a perfect, sunny day for skating!! Hopefully tomorrow will turn out to be just as beautiful....

At the moment I'm working on this embroidery with crazy chicks. It's going to become a tablerunner for easter...It's so funny to sew!

Oh, and by the way - go have a look on this nice blog.

Frøken Solhat is actually my neighbour's blog - Dorte found my blog yesterday by a happy coincidence while looking for felted chickens.......isn't it a small world???

Iceskating on an ice rink

Luckily, we can enjoy winter-like pleasures eventhough it feels like spring!!!

They had so much fun..........

Bedjacket with a twist

The other day my husband and I visited an unusual yarnshop. It was located in a water tower......

The shop sold lots of yarns, buttons, patterns and knitting books - but also art and all kinds of things to decorate your house with.

I saw many skeins of yarn which I would have loved to bring home, but I was content with 240 grams of Kauni wool and some adoring buttons. The yarn had this beautiful colour - or should I say: colours. I really like it when a yarn has a certain "life" to it.....

At first I didn't really know what to knit in it.....All I knew was, that it had to be some kind of a scarf. At autumn, winter and early spring I hardly ever leave the house without a scarf due to my bad neck and back......

I looked at different patterns...should it be a cape or a shall?

Then I remembered a fine little, black briefcase full of cards, which I recently bought at the Textile College of education in Viborg.

The cards have photos at one side and patterns at the other and are meant as an inspiration - and as advertisement cards.

This one card had excactly what I want to make. It will fit the yarn beautifully.

It is called "Bedjacket in the year of 2006" and is designed by a student at the college called Brith Hansen.

I adore the twist in the front and I can hardly wait untill I can start wearing it!

So, all I have to do now is to finish the last bit of Christian's Cobblestone!!! But.........it will not be long...........I'm getting there!

Telephone bags and eggwarmers

I must admit that I'm a big fan of beautiful, wonderful and a bit crazy ideas.... My Swedish chicks went home with me in my suitcase because of that. ....And the pictures I used to paint of sheep with Chinese, French, Danish, English and Swedish words in their wool.

Or these absolutely fantastic telephone bags made by hine from flickr.

I guess you could say that I have a childish mind. I know that is why I keep buying fabrics with swimming fish, crazy monkies, crawling ants and the likes of it....

And why I keep loving figurines like this breathtaking, wondering angel made by the Norweigian artist Lena Dybdal .

I try to take good care of that crazy, curious, playing child inside of me - when I no longer have that.....well, then I think my mind will stop givning me new ideas. And the need to explore the fantastic things and thoughts which other people create, will be gone as well.

Luckily it is that weird urge of mine, that makes me want to buy these warm little fellows.....They are knitted by an artist called Lorraine Linton from Edinburgh. (By the way - they can be bought here at "Papa Stuor" if anyone feels the need!!!)

So many, many amazing thoughts turn out to be a whole lot of happy, beautiful things.....and they are all for us to enjoy.....I love it!!!!

Fishy and dotty

I waited and waited for this fishy fabric to arrive...When it finally was put in my mailbox it didn't dissapoint me at all. The many, wonderful fish in beautiful colours and stripes make me happy. And when I used them on a dress, I sort of made them swim around, and around, and around.......

At the bottom of the dress I put some dotty fabric. I think it looks like the little bubbles which is in water (or a bit like candy?)...and the colours are very similar to the ones on the fish fabric.

I finished the dress yesterday.

Today Jennifer at NuttyIrishmanKnits gave me a You Make My Day award.

I am very happy to recieve it - and it makes me proud to know that my words and pictures make her happy. The sweet words she wrote to me made MY day...

Jennifer lives a long way from Denmark and I like the fact that communicating on the internet, brings so many wonderful, creative and caring people into my life. I have said before - I know - but it is an amazing thing to me every day...

Every day I also look at this blog made by Gitte.

We have the same kind of humor and I haven't really read her blog without smiling or laughing. Her way of writing is happy and fantastic at the same time. She is extremely good at knitting and I often get surprised by how fast she does it. You should have a look at her beautiful things....

And I must say that the EM in handball wouldn't have been the same without her wonderful comments on my blog!!

With all this in mind, I absolutely must give her the You Make My Day award....

Fastelavnsboller

Fastelavnsboller, originally uploaded by lille-ursus.

I'm not that good at baking and definitely no good at cooking. But that doesn't keep me from trying. The sad thing is, that the harder I try the worse it gets...

Luckily Christian is a brilliant cook.

However, I actually love to spend time on baking.......today I made fastelavnsboller for my family. We get them every year and I guess it was a bit too late to make them. Fastelavn was yesterday - but never mind.....

I made them from an old recipe I got from Christian's mother, and they have never failed me:

From this you get about 20 fastelavnsboller

The dough:

1 decilitre of lukewarm water

50 grams of yeast

175 grams of butter

500 grams of flour ( 8½ decilitres )

1 teaspoonful of salt

1 tablespoonful of sugar

1 decilitre of soured whole milk

1 egg

The custard: ( you can also buy this )

2 eggs

2 tablespoonful of sugar

1 tablespoonful of maizena (corn flour - to make the custard set)

2½ decilitres of milk

½ teaspoonful of vanilla

To make the dough you do this:

Mix yeast and water. Crumble the butter into the flour.

Put in water, salt, sugar, junket and egg and work the dough together. Then it needs to be put in a warm place to raise for 40 minutes.

To make the custard you do this:

Whisk eggs and sugar. Ad the rest of the ingredients and heat up the custard untill it boils, while whisking.

When the dough is ready, you roll it out flat and cut it into squares (10 x 10 centimetres). In the middle of each square you put a tablespoonful of custard. You squeeze the sides together to keep the custard inside the bun. And then you put it on the baking plate with the joining downwards.

The fastelavnsboller need to raise for another 10 minutes.

Put them in the oven for 15 - 20 minutes on 200 degrees celcius.

Finally you can decorate them with icing.

Jennifer did it again

Knitted petit fours....a perfect gift for any little girl, who wants to throw a teaparty for her friends, dolls or teddys!! The wonderful pattern is once again made by the gifted Jennifer from Nutty Irishman knits and you can find it right here. I know that I am going to make a lot - in all kind of colours....

One happy popcorn boy

One happy popcorn boy, originally uploaded by lille-ursus.

Last night we finished the last details on Emil's popcorn costume.

We used a lot of time on making it, but it was funny and Emil was so satisfied with how it turned out.....

We painted, glued, cut and wrapped in popcorns for hours and hours.

We used: 2 carton boxes, red & white paint, 4 bags of popcorn, plastic and lots of glue....

The last thing Emil said to me before he went to sleep, was how happy and excited he was about his costume.....

Insignificant wishes

On a wonderful, cold Saturday morning with my beloved family I can only wish for 2 things:

one

I really miss being able to open the frontdoor, and pick up the milk and toastbread on the doorstep!!! When I lived in England we always got our milk and toast in this way. And I have never ever since tasted any toastbread as good as the one I got in Totteridge. The slices were big and so soft. Oh!

two

I would love that we all were here in Lindvallen - including my sister and her family!!

Brown dotty dress

Brown dotty dress, originally uploaded by lille-ursus.

The past few days I have been sewing this little dress.

It is such a happy fabric with all the dots in different colours and sizes.

I can easily imagine how the fabric will look on tiny, 2 year old legs and little feet in sandals when summer comes around.....

Today I ordered some beautiful fabric from Små tekstiler . It is flax fabric with a touch of gold - doesn't that sound absolutely magnificent? And purple "ramie" fabric for a tunic for me I bought as well.

Wonderful woven trims and lovely, lovely porcelain beads from Vietnam are also on their way to my mailbox. I know that the beads will be put on a string for a bracelet.

Acutally you can see most of the things here! I can hardly wait.....But that is, however, one thing I will not have to do - Små Tekstiler is quick :0)