Our knitting instructors

We had Cookie A, a published sock knitting designer and instructor and Ragnhei∂ur Eiriksdottir, also known as Ragga, a published knitting designer and instructor.  Ragga taught us about knitting lopapeysa sweaters, which included learning about steeking, which can strike fear in the hearts of many knitters.

Cookie A telling us we really did have to do math.

Notice the lopi sweater on the chair

This is where you cut

And my favorite pic - they were a lot of fun.

Knitting loot from Iceland

Naturally on a knitting tour of Iceland there was some knitting related shopping.  Here's the knitting related purchases I made in Iceland.

Mostly Lopi yarn (the round and rectangular skeins) but a few others sneaked in!

Buttons made from sheep horn, Icelanders don't waste much!

Naturally I purchased her DVD direct from Ragga.  I'm glad I did because my joints were really hurting during her class and I probably missed some stuff.

I have enough for two Lopapeysa sweaters as well as a few other projects.  Like I needed more projects!  Gah!

When I went to purchase this the shop owner whipped out an English language version!  Nice!  It has beautiful Lopapeysa sweater patterns.

I purchased this book of graphs at the National Museum of Iceland

Viking boat sculpture

In Reykjavik, along their seawall they have a sculpture representing a viking boat.  Pretty cool!

Which sweater will I make?

Someone at work asked if the sweater I was going to make would look like all the gorgeous sweaters I've posted.  Umm, not quite.  Here's a link to the one I want to make.  Just don't hold your breath, it's going to take me a long time.

Freyja sweater - I like this sweater and it looks like something I could wear a lot here in the PNW.

I also bought some very light tan yarn with 2 skeins in different shades of purple (see next post) that I may make a different Lopapeysa sweater with.  So many possibilities!!

Wool goods

One of the things we bought was a lovely Lopapeysa sweater for my mother-in-law.  Ragga shared with us that wear and washing softens the wool.  A big trick is to use hair conditioner on it, and don't rinse it out!  Really.  This helps reduce the scratchiness.

Lopapeysa sweater for my mother-in-law

Ísafjörður, West Fjords, Iceland

Flying in it seemed like the wings of the plane were going to touch the mountain sides.  Until you realized that the road on the mountain was very small and very far away!  We had plenty of room!

Hotel Nupur

Hotel Nupur

More scenery from Iceland

Scenery from Iceland

It was a shame that most of the trip was overcast and/or rainy but here's a few more pictures from our woolen circle tour.

Icelandic Horses

Along with the sheep Icelandic horses have been isolated from other breeds since Iceland's founding.  We were able to catch a few photos of them along the tour.  At the sheep farm we toured we were able to meet a few up close.  As you will see from the pictures they are not very large.

 

 

Yes, I AM beautiful!

They'd obviously had their manes bobbed!

Here's Cookie A posing with an Icelandic Horse

Best Aunt in the World!

I vote her the nicest aunt in the world, or at the least the cleverest!  All along our trip she posed these sheep puppets and took pictures of them 'overlooking' the scenery.  Her plan is to give her nephews and nieces the puppets along with pictures of their adventures.  What a great idea!

You can just see the little gray sheep gazing down into the chasm

Viewing the valley below

Mid-Atlantic Ridge

One of the things we saw on our woolen circle tour was the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, where separating tectonic plates are slowly dividing Iceland in half.  Most of this occurs under water, but in Iceland you can see it on land.  So technically we were able to step from North America into Europe in the same day, and without a plane ride!  If you are curious you can read more at Plate Tectonics.

A recent earthquake jumbled up things a bit.  It also opened some holes that you really didn't want to fall into.

That's Cookie A, our sock instructor providing perspective.