Boogie Boogie Hedgehog

Anyone out there know how to get more hours in the day or more days in the week? Any help very much appreciated. ;) This is going to be a long post, as I'm not sure when I'll have a chance to post again this month! I'm sure most people are in the same state of chaos preparing for the holidays. My family's homemade/thrifted/recycled pledge means that many of my gifts will be going out in time for Valentine's Day, but in addition to last minute sewing and knitting and all that pesky grading, I'm trying to enjoy the seasons with friends and family, cookie baking, birthday parties, and favorite films, as well. My family arrives this week from the US and France to celebrate with me here in Finland!

My brother sent me this link and I just had to share:



I received a very cute winter quilt from the Doll Quilt 5 swap this week from Sandi in the US. She visited Finland several years ago and said thought about her trip while making the quilt. I especially love the striped binding! Thanks so much!! Sandi generously included some goodies, too, and wrapped the quilt in this gorgeous tree fabric that I promptly added to my own Doll Quilt as a border before sending it on its way!

If you're waiting to receive a swap quilt from me and want to be surprise, DON'T scroll down any further! Here's what I've been up to:

For the November WORDS themed 6-12" mini quilt swap, sent to Kim in the US. I was inspired by the song "Words" by the Swedish a cappella group The REAL Group.




For Doll Quilt 5, sent to Imagingermonkey in England. When I started, I didn't intend for it to be so wintry. (Inspired by Marimekko's Mökki (cottage/cabin) fabric.)

For Barbara's angel swap, sent to Weronica in Sweden.

There has also been a lot of knitting going on. Here's a pair of socks for a friend one time zone east of here... (Pattern available here - thanks to Barbara for the tip!)

Happy Holidays everyone! (The photo is from a dark, but beautifully lit Helsinki this week; I was there for work, but found time for a little Christmas market browsing and yarn shopping, too!)

Grün, grün, grün ist alles, was ich hab!

I just closed my December 3rd Give-Away day post to comments a few hours after the promised time of 8pm Finnish time with 292 comments! Holy cow! I can't believe how many comments this Sew, Mama, Sew event inspired, not only on my blog, but around the blogosphere! One thing I noticed that was strange, though, is that several comments didn't show up in my inbox. Did this happen to anyone else?

I'm going to wait until the morning to wade through all the comments, but one thing I noticed was that the most common favorite color mentioned was green. If you ask me my favorite color, I'll say I don't have one. If you push me, or if you've visited my living room, I'd have to say green. It's been a theme lately. (No favoritism to the green-lovers in the drawing, though!)

Here are the two minis I made for the 6-12" swap in October:

The one with the buttons will be my inspiration for the give-away quilt I hope to make in the next day or two. The second was for the 'out of the box' category for non-rectangular minis.

Speaking of green, here's the simple hat (a k3p3 rib) I recently finished for my brother as an early Christmas gift. I had to rip out the whole thing and start again with fewer stitches cast-on during my 36 hour odyssey from Köln to Vaasa last week and by the time the ripping happened, I'd met up with a friend at Arlanda and we were so tired and giddy that the yarn started talking to us and he gave the project its name: the Feed-Me-Seymour hat. I hope it doesn't get hungry and eat my brother. (The yarn is Phildar Giboulées, chosen by my brother and purchased last month in Paris.) Along with the hat, you can see my all-time favorite book, which just happens to have a holiday theme. The English title is Of Course Polly Can Do Almost Everything. I love the Ilon Wikland illustrations.

And sticking with the green theme, here's a sneak peek at my quilt for the Doll Quilt 5 swap - on its way Saturday (a few days late, but I hope the recipient will be understanding) to a European destination. This quilt also includes red, yellow, and brown - it's not easy being green all the time!

Give-Away Day!

I've decided to participate in the Sew, Mama, Sew December 3rd Give-Away day, despite the million other projects I should be working on for the holidays. You can check out the master list of participants here. Hope I can find time to make the rounds later today!

I'll be giving away a mini quilt (about 6"x6"), along with some Finnish holiday chocolate.

Just comment on this post by tomorrow (Thursday December 4th) 8pm Finnish time (GMT+2) and I'll choose a name randomly. Be sure to include your favorite color in your comment!

I have some crafty things to post, but will save those for tomorrow. In the meantime, here are just a few photos from my recent trip to France!