Matching matches

I just love candles.This is just the season to light as many as possible. Every day, on each table. I also tend to forget matches on the table, simple little boxes but little bit dull looking. I solved the problem by matching the matches into other decorations. Now their are cute. With  a little  piece of lace, old book sheets and a wooden button their are brand new looking, and ready to be forgotten on the table again.

My New Garland at the Front Door, version 1/2011

Our family has a summer cottage couple of hundred kilometers north from the south coast of Finland and last week I took a little break from work to spend couple of days there with the kids and grand parents. The nature around the cottage was still beautiful though summer is gone and even the fall is already turning into winter. We took long walks in the forest and I collected natural materials for a new front door garland.




Now that we still don't have any snow , it is easy to find materials from the forest. I used long willow twigs to create a base for the wreath. The leaveless blueberry branches are the main material and they are accompanied by some gray lichen. They were easy to tie together with iron wire, as they are rather light. The last bit was to decorate the wreath with a lingonberry branch, a small cone and a figure of a reindeer.

This is not only for christmas,
but for the wait of the snowy winter

Some thinning was done in the nearby forest and we found a huge pile of fir branches which still wait for my inspiration to make something out of them. They would also be great  material for a garland, but could I think of something else? Ideas anyone?

A knitted heart

I bought Christmas magazines and got hundreds of new ideas. That was bit of a promise, 'cause one of the magazines was called "101 Idéer" which is "101 Ideas". So this beautiful hearth was introduced in the magazine. It was knitted from different yarn and felted in the washing machine. And as the magazine was written in Swedish, I could not completely understand the instructions, so with a little help from my best friend I made my own version, which I think is even more cute than the original. I used needles sized 3 1/2 mm and the wool yarn, which I usually use for thick stockings.

This is how I made it:
1. Cast on three stiches.
2. Knit st stiches during the whole heart. Increase 1 stich in the beginning and in the end on each right side row by working into front and back of the first and the last stich. Continue untill you have 38 stiches.
3."Bubbles"
Knit bubbles by making five stiches out of one. (knit the front and the back loop in turns to create five stiches before letting the stich fall of the needle. Knit these five new stiches back and forth three rows and then knit all five together on the right side. You have created a bubble. Continue knitting st stiches until the next bubble. I made bubbles on every fifth row,  approximately after every 7 stiches;  1-2-3-4-5-6-5-4 pcs.  as shown it the picture.
4. When you have 38 stiches in the row, knit 12 rows without increasing and then decrease in the beginning and in the end of every right side row by knitting two stiches together until you have 30 stiches. Knit st stiches four rows.
5. Bind off.
6. Make the back piece of the hearth likewise, but without the bubbles.
7. Make a handle by knitting st stiches with 8 stiches until you reach the lenght you wish.
8. Sew the pieces together on the back side.
9. Sew a small bag out of a fabric (f.e. flannel). Sew it inside the hearth like a lining. Fill the extra space inside the heart with cotton wool before sewing the lining.

10. The hearth is now ready to be filled with candy, small gifts or ginger breads to greet your friends or family, or even the postman at the front door!

The Old Pictures of My Family

My aunt has made a big effort on scanning our old photos. I got a collection by e-mail, and could not wait to make something "christmastly" out of them. So I made this piece of art.

When our house was about to be built we had to take down an old sauna -building from our lot. That's when I got loads of old windowframes. I wanted to make some use of them, so this was one idea.






 

 


I knocked around nails in the back, then put a paper string between them. The photos are clipped to the string with traditional Christmas tree candle holders (for real candles), which still are a bit shiny, but hopefully will darken in time.

To accompany the photos, I hang some Christmas decoration, but fell so much in love this thing, that it has been in my hobby room the whole year. That is my Christmas Wonderland!