We Interrupt This Blog to Announce...

It's heeeeeere!​

The book has been released!  To say it, makes it sound like it is a wild ravenous bear.  Perhaps the keeper left the barred door unlocked -- by mistake -- and the bear escaped without notice.  This is the way it feels, too.  I've been tending these essays and patterns for a year, and been tending to migraines the last couple days.  The last few days have also been spent fending emails, tweets and fb notifications.  And all to this effect:   ​It's here.

What (else) Would Madame Defarge Knit?—It's Here! »

If you've pre-ordered—the eVersion will arrive in your inbox later today.* If you haven't ordered yet there are release day goodies and discounts to entice you, but only until 3pm EDT on Saturday (of ...

​http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/4/prweb10602622.htm

Until 3pm EST Saturday, free goodies will arrive with the download.  After that time, they will disappear.  The chief goody is another of my patterns, The Comfort of a Friend Woman Shawl, also called the Cross-My-Heart/18-hour Shawl.  Starting April 16, I am leading a Knit-Along with this Shawl, and YOU, if you will join me!​

Another day, another knit...

This morning, early, I cast on Babysvøbet - Det hele kongerige by Marianne Knorborg. This is a shetland shawl the Crown Princess Mary of Denmark (an Australian commoner) has brought both her babies home from the hospital wrapped in.  
​

I've been eyeing it for quite some time, but I've been a day late and a skein short.  It takes a lot of skeins.  I now have 16 skeins of Jamieson Shetland (grown and processed on the Shetland islands, thank you very much), and I'm still worried I don't ​have enough. I'm halfway through the center square, and I'm halfway through the first skein.  It's boring enough.  Good thing the next part involves a lot of Danish translation

embriotic shetland shawl

Actual color is dark, dark green or "pine."​

On to the story already in progress: my solo trip to the Vesterheim!​

​It took awhile to find them, but once I did, the people of Iowa were very nice.

​The Vesterheim. Everyone should go!

The Vesterheim's Sámi exhibit.  ​

I left the family having a lovely holiday in Minneapolis and drove down for an appointment with a curator and some gorgeous hand knits in the holdings.  What an incredible thing to be ushered into the inner sanctum -- just me and my camera -- and allowed to handle, take notes on and pictures of some beautiful, vintage Norwegian hand knits.  

​My uncle and aunt's gákti.

​The man's gákti collar.  From Enontëkio, Finland.

The woman's gákti shawl and brooch.  From Enontëkio, Finland.

I was well into this Sámi thing, when I found out my aunt is of Sámi heritage. I always knew she was Norwegian-Finnish extraction.  It turns out the Finnish part was a Sámi man from Enontëkio -- the far, far NW of Finland. These beautiful Sámi gáktis are hers.  Don't you love the stacks and stacks of ribbons?  The shawl and brooch?

​More from the holdings tomorrow!

A late Easter post

Made by my son

An Adventure, cont'd

While in Minneapolis viewing the beautiful holdings at the American Swedish Institute...​

​reindeer skin pouch decorated with beads

Sámi gákti

​woven bands on bells

​knitted socks and mittens

​birch bark bag

...we did other fun Sámi things, like visit North America's first Sámi themed coffee house.  The Lavvu Coffee House is owned and operated by Chris Pesklo, a Minnesota native of Sámi ancestry, whose other jobs are lavvu builder and former Social Studies teacher.  His Lavvu website can be found at http://www.lavvu.com/index.html.  Lavvu are the tipi-like tents Sámi traditionally made and travel with.

​North America's only Sámi inspired coffee house

Dinkytown, MN

​lavvu coffee

​knitting in the lavvu

​working on a Sámi mitten in the coffee house 

We also visited Ikea for the first time.  Wow.  It's like furniture Disneyland!  We purchased a few things, and I briefly considered moving there.  ​

Tomorrow:  my first trip to Decorah, Iowa, and the motherland of all museums: The Vesterheim!​