Peacocks and a basket of flowers - Swedish pattern

Happy midsummer! Trevlig midsommar!


We had a fantastic midsummer celebration today. Love this Swedish custom.
So that all my readers can also celebrate with us, I have created a little pattern with old Swedish motifs: peacocks and a basket of flowers.

I am off to Hungary tomorrow, so if you don't see me for a while, that's the reason. But perhaps I can check in once in a while. Have a lovely summer, everyone.


Click on the picture to get the pdf.

Free bookmark pattern - based on an old sampler motif

I have been playing again with some patterns from the old Swedish books that I bought at an antique fare.
Just so that everyone know, I would like to make it clear that I am not using copyrighted material as my own. I know these is a difficult area so I will try to explain how I see this.

First, these books are about 70+ years old, although I am not sure when the copyright would have expired or how. But most of the patterns in them are really patterns that can be found all over Europe. There are patterns that I see again and again on old Hungarian, Ukrainian, German, Austrian, Latvian etc., etc. embroideries, not to mention Quaker an other early American things. It might be because of this that I "feel" they are in the public domain. In Hungary we say folk art is something that wasn't created by one person, but kind of a common creation: we don't know where it comes from originally, and everyone changes it a bit as they use it and share it. So there are endless variations of it.

Secondly, even so I never use these pattern as they are, I wouldn't copy a pattern from a book here and say they are mine. I use them more as inspiration. In this pattern, what I liked was the very simple form of the flowers, and the original red and blue colours. We also have red and blue together in some areas in Hungary. But apart from that, the overall design is my own work: the size of the motif, the layout, the repetitive element, the border etc.

I hope I am expressing myself clearly. If anyone knows for sure that I am in the wrong, please, correct me.

So, after all this, here is the bookmark that I created inspired by some patterns in an old Swedish book, but I wouldn't say they are really Swedish patterns, more like old European sampler motifs. Apart from using the original colour scheme, I also made a more modern, fresher looking one.

Which one do you like more?




Click on the pictures for the pdf.

Swedish folk pattern and some WIP

Hi, dear friends.

I have been really busy lately with my sewing machine and other stuff.
I am learning quilting. Here is my second attempt. (The first one was a simple piece sewn together from 10 x 10 cm squares, not very well - I am still thinking to do something with it.)

I was trying to do a log cabin quilt. I cut lots of 5 cm wide strips and started working. I don't have a real fabric stash, absolutely no quilting fabric, only some odds and ends that I bought in second hand shops or got as donation from colleagues. I tried to pick some light and dark fabrics, and started sewing them together. Here are some pictures of the process, but mostly I was too excited sewing, so I didn't take many photos.







As my blocks grew, I had to realise that my seams are not precise and my cutting was not ver exact either, so some of the lines on the blocks turned out to be a bit wonky. After some thinking I came up with a "brilliant" solution - I will make the blocks so that the log cabins are leaning a bit to the left and right, this way it won't be so visible that they are not perfect. Ha! As if this was a solution - for someone who is a beginner!
I saw some pictures and calculated for myself what size triangles I need for the edges. And I didn't have much fabric that was good with the other colours so had to be careful. Of course, I made mistakes when cutting and sewing again, so at the end it turned out even worse. There were even more seams to match.


In the close-up you can see the not-so-matching seams:




But there are some that are almost OK - purely by accident, though:





Anyway, here is the final result - and in spite of all the mistakes I am VERY happy with it. :D





This is only the quilt top, now I am going to learn how to quilt it. I don't have any batting, need to buy something for the back, too. Until I can do that, I will practice with smaller pieces. It will have to be straight lines quilting, because I also need to buy a free motion foot for the sewing machine and buying all that might take some time.


I have also been knitting a pullover for my daughter. It is almost ready now, I only need to sew in the sleeves. It was made, as most of my knitting, without patterns, just improvising. I knitted the body on the round, and the cowl neck, too. One of the problems with improvising is when you have made one sleeve, it is terribly hard to duplicate it - so I decided to make the second sleeve different. Purely for laziness - but I think it looks really cool. I hope Eszter will like it. It is absolutely soft and warm, it is an alpaca boucle yarn from Drops. Of course, since spring is here, she will need a really warm pullover - NOT. But I didn't manage to finish it in winter, so she will have to wait until next autumn to wear it. :=/







And I also crocheted a little cat for her, to go in the packet when I send the pullover:



This was also made without pattern. Perhaps I should try and write it down?


And here is a small Swedish folk cross stitch pattern for you all to enjoy, I think it is lovely. It was inspired by some old patternbooks I have.

Have fun :)

Second sunday of advent

Hi, everyone,


Have just come home from our advent concert with the choir I joined in August. I have to say it is so difficult, especially at this time of the year. We are singing lots of songs that are "common" at Christmastime in Sweden, but to me they are all new. Also, I missed lots of practices because I was sick, then my daughter came, then I was sick again... I tried to learn the songs on my own, but it is not so easy. Anyway, we did all right, although I wasn't very sure of myself.


I am thinking of closing down my on-line shop. I started it in May and there was only one sale. I feel a bit disappointed. Not too much, I never expected to make lots of money from my craft, but still. Anyway, we are organising a charity event in my school, a concert with the kids singing and playing, and all the money we get from the tickets goes to orphans in India. So I thought we can do a craft fair at the same time. I have a few kids who kept coming in one or two afternoons, after lessons, to my classroom and making little things: bracelets, christmas ornaments etc (there is even a stuffed ice-cream cone!!!)- we are going to set up a table and sell them. I will also bring lots of my things: pincushions, biscornus, bracelets, and try to sell them. At least they can serve a good cause.
And then the online shop will just go. Or perhaps I can leave the photos there and just say that I take orders... don't know.


I have been busy this last week, and we had lots of snow, and I had to go to the dentist (2 hours, brr), then practice the songs - there wasn't much time left for stitching. I am missing it, actually. I started this little angel but couldn't finish it. The pattern was inspired by an old Swedish motif but I changed it quite a bit and I think it looks really modern now.

Hope you will enjoy it. I am stitching it in light blue. What colour would you choose?

Palkó (who is sharing my name) has stitched it. Here

More Swedish charts

I have made a little Swedish pattern, the Dala horse, which can be almost called the symbol of Sweden. Originally coming from the province of Dalarna, the Dala horse is made of wood and painted. I know, I know, there are quite a few cross stitch patterns of it out there already, but I wanted to try my hand with it.

I wanted to keep it simple and easy, I had in mind some quick Christmas cards or gift tags, perhaps a pincushion or a scissor fob. But when Stephen saw it, he said it wasn't good enough: the Dala horse should have more decorative harness. So I made another version, still small and easy, just a little bit fancier.

I will show you both, you can decide which one you want to stitch. The traditional colours are red, with green, blue, yellow and white decoration but of course there are lots of other versions, so it absolutely all right to change the colours.

Happy stitching. :)

By the way, one of my few patterns for sale is a doll in folklore costume from Dalarna. Just in case someone is interested, look at my Pages.

New finishes and a Christmas freebie

Hi, everyone, how are you doing?

Have you started your Christmas stitching yet?

I have made a free Christmas pattern. Apart from the usual motifs I used some Swedish motifs that I really love. The deer is used widely in Sweden, although it is quite a universal pattern all over Europe. But the Julbok, the goat is typical Swedish, as is the crown. I hope you like it. You can use them together or one by one on gift tags or cards.

I have finished two pieces recently: one is Celtic Knot by Textile Heritage. I have stitched it on an afghan, I am collecting different Celtic patterns on it.

The other is my own Dove that I published in my last post. To be honest, I myself didn't think it will turn out this good, I am very happy with it. I used variegated threads, Anchor 1204 on the wing and DMC 4110 on the body. For the wing and the tail I stitched in rows, to have this stripey appearance, for the body I stitched in little block or circles so it became more blotchy. I made one little change: I backstitched a circle around the eye. I felt the eye was a bit too small.

What do you all think? What colours would you use?

Right after I wrote about my bargain finds last time, I happened to be in the Red Cross shop again. (Only by accident, you understand.) This is part of what I came away with (I bought lots of buttons and yarn to take to school, too).

One of these books is called "Embroidery, cutting, sewing", the other "Rare cross stitch".

Lots of embroidery fabric, a thread holder in wood and a tool to wrap yarn on (what is it called?), and some more yarn, and bags of different embroidery threads:wool, cotton, linen, perle.

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Needlework books and a free pattern

Good morning!

We have autumn break in Sweden so finally I have time and energy to write a blog post. I have been planning to write for weeks but life has been hectic. Not to mention that my back has been causing me so much pain that I couldn't do much. I am still in pain but it is getting a bit better. Fingers crossed, please, everyone. :)


So, I have been planning to show all the beautiful books I have bought or received recently. Sweden is full of treasures, as I have told you a few times. Not only can you buy lovely old fabric, weaving, lace and embroidery in every second-hand shop but they also have bookshelves in those shops, there are lovely used book-shops and you can find books in he "loppis" which is something in between a garage sale and a second-hand shop.

Here are my latest finds: embroidery, textile art and sewing patterns. They are not the latest fashion, but I just love them, it is so much fun looking at old patterns - and if I ever get to that level in sewing, I might be able to adjust them a bit. And the embroidery patterns don't age, right? :)


I found the first book in this Encyclopedia of Home Needlework (or something like that) at a loppis, then bought the second one from the internet. I am looking for the rest (20 volumes altogether) but they are not easy to find. No wonder: this is a fantastic book, with basically everything you can think of and some more. It is in Swedish but that is not so much a problem any more :D

Here is another lovely book and a page with some beautiful old weaving. I wonder what the three-legged figure means - it appears more than once on woven clothes.

This one I bought on the internet. It is not only textiles but all kinds of crafts, e.g. woodcarving, basket weaving etc.

These two folders I found at a Red Cross shop. One is needlework (weaving and embroidery), the other is sewing patterns.

This is the perfect example of the sewing patterns from the 70s. I think it is hilarious! I have threatened Stephen to make him something like this if he doesn't behave LOL.

And there is one more folder with tons of sewing patterns and very useful instructions. I think I will use it in school.

These two little pattern booklets I received as a gift from Stephen. He found them on Tradera (the Swedish e-bay) and bought them for me. Can you see the name and year? 1962! They are lovely. You can look forward to some more Swedish inspiration in my patterns.

Let's go over to what I have been stitching lately. Not much (hanging head in shame). But some. I found this Christmas card pattern in my UFO bag. I think I started it 3 years ago but when I saw I won't finish it before Christmas, put it down. Then repeated the same the next year. Last year I didn't even take it out. But now I managed to finish it. It is a DMC kit that I received from a friend on crossstitchforum.com and it uses lots of metallic thread. I actually loved stitching it. So many people complain about metallics, especially DMC but I had no trouble at all. And I love the overall effect. You just can't have too much bling, can you? :D The colours are so unusual and still so great. (I lost one of the buttons - but have since found it.)

I have made some small felt ornaments too: Swedish hearts and Hungarian tulips. I have been trying to teach myself how to draw Hungarian folk patterns (and other patterns - I have discovered Zentangle!) On the gray fabric you can see my embroidered doodling, the traditional tulip with French knots and rice stitch - makes it very modern, don't you think so? I made that without drawing the pattern on the fabric, just improvised. Will use this piece of fabric for other experiments.

This is another gift. Stephen's parents visited us a few weeks ago. After they went home, his mum sent me this. It is an Eva Rosenstrand kit, a tablecloth, that she started long ago but as her eyes are not good enough to stitch, she sent it to me to finish. Isn't that really kind of her? I love this, I will surely stitch it.

Perhaps you want to have a look at my weaving experiment? I couldn't do much on it, it doesn't go well with backache. :( So I have done this much:

Two small butterflies that I stitched for a charity organisation for quilts.

I took out another UFO, my Celtic afghan and started a Celtic knot pattern, this is what I am working on right now. I love it but I am so sad because I cannot keep the back of the stitching neat. Too many colour changes. :(

Sorry that it has become such a long post with so many pictures. I hope you still find it interesting.

Finally, another free cross stitch pattern. This is a dove, it has a bit of a folk art feeling to it but still modern. At least that was the intention :) I hope y ou like it. Enjoy stitching it.