Holidays in Denmark

Today has been a typical April weather. There is a country lore that says:

'April, April, er macht, was er will' 

(April is doing what he likes)

 And this morning it looked like this:

It was snowing heavily and everything got white in a few minutes. My poor little plants, lettuce, spinach and parsley were covered with snow. But it didn't last, half an hour later the soil was fuming and the sun came out again.

But I wanted to write about our family holidays in Denmark. We rented a house in Veijers that was situated only 100 m away from the beach (the North Sea again).

This was our house, a cosy place to be. There are a lot of holiday houses in this area, all are situated in the dunes.

 It is great to walk through the dunes passing little houses on the one side and overlooking the ocean on the other side. Pepples loves to walk these little paths!

 And the beach is great, just so great.

One day we went to Billund, LEGOLAND! We have been there already several times when the kids were smaller, I even had been there when I was a kid, almost 35 years ago! Going there evokes so many lovely memories for us that we couldn't resist going there again. 

The children of course loved the different rides and events, we spent several hours taking a ride with the Viking River Splash or the X-treme Racer. But afterwards we took a look at the the heart of the Legoland, the Miniland. There you can see famous buildings and places from all over the world built out of more than 20 million LEGO bricks.

 Unfortunately I got a bad cold the other day so I had to stay indoors. But it didn't really matter too much, I was able to read and crochet and my family went swimming and enjoyed themselves. 

I got better soon and we were able to go to the beach again. It was such a pleasure for us being there. One sunny day when we were strolling at the beach, the boys playing football, my girl and I collecting beautiful stones and shells, there was fog approaching the beach very fast. 

 

 

 The sky looked amazing and it changed almost every minute.

 

I could show you a gazillion number of photos, I was so fascinated by the surroundings that I took many, many pictures.

 I am a true ocean girl, if I could I would move to the coastline and watch the sky and the horizon every day. I would listen to the whisperings of the sea and the sand and the crying of the seagulls for the whole day. 

 And the sunsets, of course, There is no better place in the world to watch a sunset than a beach - in my opinion at least. All your worries and thoughts and anxieties just fade away - together with the sun - while watching a beautiful sunset. I always calm down, my mind gets empty and I can forget about everything.

 It has been my birthday in Denmark, as well. It was such a lovely day. My family even baked a cake called "Donauwelle" with cherries, pudding cream and chocolate, hmm yummie!

And my daughter coloured several of the stones we had found at the beach to write me a "Happy Birthday", isn't this cute?

The weather was not so good that day so we decided to go to Esbjerg, a larger town nearby. And there was a Sostrene Grene shop where you can find wonderful things to decorate your home and - yarn. Especially soft cotton yarn that is not expensive at all and it comes in wonderful colours. And it was my birthday, hey, what do you thing I did? I helped myself with another birthday present ...

Yarn in six yummie ocean colours, I just couldn't help myself, I had to take some of this delicious yarn home. I almost feel the blanket in my hands that I will make of these delicious balls of joy!

  Goodbye for now!

See you soon and take care,

Viola

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Spring holidays in the Netherlands

 At the beginning of our Easter holidays we went to the Netherlands for one week. We are so lucky that my parents have a holiday house there, just a few hundred metres away from the North Sea. I just love it there! The house is situated in Ouddorp, a small village in the Dutch province Zuid-Holland, approximately 40 km south of Rotterdam.

It was just me and the kids, J couldn't get the week off, he had to work. But the children had asked their best friends to accompany us, so it was me and four kids and our dog Pepples, of course. We had never tried this before and I wondered if everything would be fine. But it was not only fine, no, it was a great week. The children were really excited to show their friends around. The weather was wonderful and we were outside almost all the time. 

 The dune landscape is so pretty. There is a long cycleway on top of the dunes, you can walk or cycle for kilometres always overlooking the Sea.

 We went to the beach to fly the kites. Kitebuggies are always there when the wind is blowing.

 The lighthouse "Westhoofd" in Ouddorp. It is still in operation. 

 I started a new granny shawl for my sister. Her birthday has already been in March but I hope that she won't mind to get it a little later. 

  At home Pepples doesn't like to run after the stick anymore but at the beach she felt young again!

 One day was so warm that the children decided to go swimming! The water temperature was just 9 degrees. Crazy kids!

 Log walks at the beach were fun for all!

 The girls were really fast on their inline skates, Pepples and I had difficulties to follow them. We made beautiful tours! 

The boys explored the vicinity with their longboards but they preferred being on their own. 

And at the end of the day, just once or twice, we went to Paal 10 to have a last drink. These beach restaurants are a great place to be, I love to sit on the terrace drinking a hot tea when it's cold or a glass of wine on a wonderful summer evening.

It has been a wonderful week. I read two books (!), crocheted a lot and most of the time I was the first in bed! We will definitely do this again, the kids had so much fun with their friends and I had lots of space for myself.

This post is long enough I think. I hope that I will be able to write about our holiday week in Denmark  tomorrow. 

See you then,

Viola

It's grey and dark....

... the wind is blowing and I wonder where spring has gone. It looks like November outside! This is just a quick post to say hello after our wonderful holidays. I will tell you about it later.

Unfortunately I got a bad cold last week and I still feel not so well, bad cough again ... 

So today I decided to take it easy, drink lots of tea, forget about the piles of laundry and the sandy floors (I wonder why we always bring back so much sand after a week at the sea) and start a new crochet project using all my scraps of yarn. 

I have so many leftovers from my blankets that are not really useful for the next big crochet project. 

What are you doing with all these sweet little balls of yarn? You can't really start something new with them but I have not the heart to just throw them away. 

'A cushion' I thought this morning when I passed the bowl with all my Stylecraft remnants. 

 And without further thinking and 'pinteresting' I decided to use the simple 2-round solid granny square to start with. It is the perfect size to use even the smallest amounts of yarn and looking at these colourful littles squares makes me really happy!

Last but not least I want to welcome my new followers, I hope you like my little crochet snippets. And I want to say 'Thank you!' for all your encouraging comments, I love to read them and I always try to take a look at your blogs, as well. 

Take care whereevere you are in the world! 

Viola

Japanese Flower Scarf: Ta-dah!

  Looking at the above picture I suddendly feel happy! I took this picture last summer, just a few days after our holiday in the Netherlands. I felt quite relaxed and I was looking forward finishing my Japanese Flower Scarf. There were just a few flowers missing because I had run out of yarn. I ordered it immediately but somehow, when the cough started again, I lost my interest in this wonderful scarf and it took me several weeks to finish it. But one days somwhere in the middle of autumn - I can't really remember anymore when - I added the last flower, weaved in the last ends and could block it.

Since then I have worn this scarf a lot, the texture is soft and delicate and it drapes wolderfully around the shoulders. The yarn is DROPS Belle, a mix of cotton, viscose and linen, it is perfect to wear directly on the skin.

 

 I used the folloowing colours: Moss green, light blue, jeans blue, dark jeans blue, cherry, old pink, dandelion, silver and off white. I can absolutely recommend this yarn. 

  I have LOVED working on this project, making these flowers is addictive once you have started. I already think of making a wooly scarf in bright bold colours and one in pastels or even natural colours - I just can't decide. It is such a lovely pattern and very suitable for carrying around!

I was working the colours totally at random and using the join-as-you-go method, so I had to pay very careful attention to the placement of them. But I managed quite well, what do you think?

The only thing that tempers my delight a little bit is that the flowers tend to look a little scrunched, with curl-up petals after some time. I have already blocked this scarf 3 times. But it is not that bad considering how beautiful this scarf is and how much delight I feel wearing it.

Enough talk now. 

HERE IT IS!

 

 

 This is me wearing the scarf. 

GEEZ! I really look tired! The last year truly drained me of strength. Next week we'll spend a week in my parents cottage in the Netherlands. Long walks at the beach, enough sleep and good food will hopefully do me some good. 

These cute Easter rabbits seem to like my scarf, as well.

Happy Easter! 

Viola

Back again....

...and almost feeling well again.

I am back here after an unintentional break of more than half a year. I am really sorry for this and I am stupendously happy to be back again. I missed you! But I really had a rough trot the last months. I was ill almost all the time.

COUGH - my mostly hated word at the moment. I coughed many, many months, days and nights, almost non-stop. And when it was getting worse I got high fever and a real bad cold. Nobody could find out what was wrong with me. One doctor thought that it was allergic asthma but he couldn't find out what the allergenic substance was. My GP finally asked me if my problem could be a psychosomatic one and if I would be willing to recieve a therapy. I almost agreed because I was truly worried that I would never get better again and there was a tinge of despondency and forlornness seeping into almost everything I did. It was so hard to keep going, my illness affected our daily life enormously.

But then J and I finally found out what the problem was. It was the new laser printer my husband used in his home office. I couldn't tolerate the toner powder of this printer. His office is on the first floor right next to our sleeping room and the toner powder just spread everywhere.

The first thing we did was to banish the printer from our house. Then we started to clean up. I washed all our clothes (oh my, have you ever washed everything you have at once???) but it was a good opportunity to weed out all that was old or no longer fitting. We cleaned everything, the shelves, the cupboards, the books, Cd's, we even moved the all furniture to clean behind them. I also washed all blankets, cushions and the plush toys of the children. Woohoo, long live the washing machine!

My bronchial tubes are still a little inflamed and sore and I easily feel tired and worn out but life is getting better from day to day! I keep on telling me that I just have to be a little more patient and then one day I will feel strong and cheerful and I will be my happy self again!

Enough about that. I have to show you lots of things. Working on my crochet projects has been one of the few things that really distracted me from my worn-out state during the last months. Crocheting is kind of a therapy when everything is going wrong, isn't it? At least for me it is.

First of all, I finished my 'Tiny-Granny-Blanket'. Do you remember it?

I had taken these fotos last summer and it was such a joy to work on this blanket. My daughter loved to play with the colours, she often adviced me which colour combination had to be the next one. When she sat next to me playing with the yarn and the squares we nattered about school and friends and the yarn colours and in the end she knew all the names of the Stylecraft colours I used. 

Here is my blanket in its full glory!

It is a large blanket consisting of 532 mini-grannies, the size  is 2,00 x 1,45 m. 

I used 35 different colours of Stylecraft Special DK.

 Pepples, our dog, is always watching what I'm doing.

 I really love the colourful jollity of this blanket and it is much thicker and warmer than my rainbow ripple blanket.

The border is simple, just 7 rows of granny stripes in plum and pale rose. The last row is a stitch I just learned, the crap stitch - and it is gorgeous! It gives such a neat and solid finish to a blanket. I am so happy that I found out about this stitch.

Here are my two crochet blankets.

They are real beauties and already well-used on the sofa. My son loves the ripple, my daughter the granny, it makes my heart sing in joy when I see my kiddies snuggling down in these blankets.

There is so much more that I want to show you but this is it for today. I have to decorate the house for spring and Easter, we just managed to put away the snowmen and snowflakes - no more snow for me, please. I hope that spring is coming soon, I long for the sun and some warmth. 

I'll be back soon (really soon) to show you more of my makes. Have a beautiful weekend!

Viola