From My Stash: Icelandic Minis

Today is the one year anniversary of my trip to Iceland. It’s hard to believe that it has already been a year since I packed my oversized camping backpack, boarded a flight, and landed in a country where the sun doesn’t set until 11 PM and where 45 degrees in May is considered balmy. Where nearly all of the vegetables are imported and where cities feel like they haven’t aged in years.

That trip was big for me for so many reasons, but a highlight that I still treasure the most while traveling with my group around the western coast was the afternoon we spent learning about Icelandic traditions of natural dyeing with Gudrun Bjarnadottir. (You can read all about that day and the incredible people we met here.) I got a chance to purchase these mini skeins from a local wool cooperative outside of Reykjavik, naturally dyed by local artisans and made out of, of course, single ply Icelandic wool. Unfortunately, these skeins can’t be found online, but you can find naturally dyed Icelandic wool in full skeins at Gudrun’s Etsy store, or by searching for Hespa yarn, and a very similar single-ply base in the wool called Einband.

I still remember SO VIVIDLY standing in that co-op agonizing over which of these skeins to bring home because each of the dozens of shades on display was so lovely and I had such a hard time choosing. I have a lot of dreams for what I would like for these skeins to be but even now, a year later, I am perfectly content admiring them and making as careful of a decision for what they will be as I was in choosing them in the first place. Their colors haven’t faded even a bit from their original beauty and I know that they will be skeins or finished pieces that I will share with my loved ones for many years to come.

Iceland Part 6: Wool from start to finish

On our last day together as a group, we started the day by prioritizing one of the most important things: pastries. We grabbed rolls with ham and cheese and massive sweet rolls before hitting the road back south by a new route. At a local gas station off route 1 we finally saw a large group of tourists after many days of feeling very uncrowded, and I bought a green juice, trying to make up for the dirth of vegetables I had consumed over the previous seven days. Seeing all of those other tourists somehow made me so grateful for our knowledgeable guide and all of the experience and perspective she brought to our journey.

Our first step of the day was the Textile Museum in Blondous about an hour's drive from the northern city we had spent the last few nights. The museum sits on the coast of the fjord and is directly adjacent to the first women's college in Iceland, and which now serves as the lodging and workspaces for visiting artists in residence for the Textile Museum. While small, the museum was richly detailed, and I was shocked that the staff encouraged us to put on gloves and handle some of the pieces in the museum directly, getting to handle the intricate lace shawls, mittens, and more that were on display. After hearing all week about lace patterns, traditional shapes, and the fine history of Icelandic handknitting it was so exciting to see it all in person. After studying and creating spider lace, eyelet patterning, eight-point flowers, and natural gradients, it was inspiring to see these elements throughout all of Iceland's knitting history. The mittens were some of my absolute favorites, and I look forward to recreating some someday for my own everyday use.

In Blondous, we also visited the first step in the process of wool becoming yarn. Istex, the company that produces 90% of all of Icelandic yarn in the country, operates different pieces of the process of making wool into yarn throughout the western regions in Iceland. Our first step on this journey was the intake of all of the raw wool that will transform over many stages, hours, and machines to be suitable for knitting. Giant bales of raw wool filled the processing center where the fleeces are sorted by color and grade, washed, scoured, and dried. Naturally-colored wool is becoming increasingly rare in Iceland, as Istex dyes all of its wool for its own specific colors and drives a demand in the market for predominantly white wool from farmers. Helene shared that she would love to expand the palette of naturally-colored wool in her own yarn lines someday and work to rebuild the market for it in Iceland.

Examining a lock ready to be washed for quality and grading

We waved from our window to Hotel Hrausnef and the elves that guard its entrance on our way to Borgarnes, about 40 minutes outside of Reykjavik. Here, we also got to have our first experience shopping for yarn in a grocery store and to say I was overwhelmed would probably be an understatement. :)

Never mind the odd looks from the locals :)

The epicenter of all yarn-making in Iceland is the Istex mill outside of Reykjavik, where freshly-washed wool becomes yarn in a hundred colors. The people who work here have so much knowledge and experience in yarnmaking and honing their process and craft. They were really generous to share it all with us and answer all of our questions.

Mountains of wool awaiting their turn to be carded & spun

The final step in the yarn's journey to become a finished object led us to Helene's own studio in a cozy neighborhood inside the city. A light-filled mid-century studio full of knitted garments and modern interpretations of Icelandic wool blew us all away and was so inspiring. Spending time there I also began to realize a sense of nostalgia in our group, knowing that this would be our last stop in our journey together before parting ways, back to our homes across the globe after a life-changing week. We lingered long, wanting to absorb everything, and not wanting it to all come to an end.

All good things do come to an end, however, and almost a year later I cannot believe that I had the chance to go on this amazing trip, to experience this journey in myself and within this beautiful group of women who believe in the magic of two sticks turning wool into something warm. I cannot say enough good things about Helene's knitting workshops and would be happy to share any more information about my experience traveling to Iceland or about this retreat specifically. Now that I am finally caught up on sharing about this amazing trip, I'm also excited to share about the yarn I brought home, and the garments I've been knitting with Icelandic wool. Coming soon!

Iceland: Part 5 (Up North, the Glaumbær Turf Farm & Spider Lace)

The next day, we continued our journey north. We drove on roads so elevated and narrow that in the wintertime, they become impassable, and we also learned about the unique sheep herding culture in Iceland. We passed a sheep pen which had many smaller pens inside of it, used annually by farmers. In Iceland, all of their sheep roam completely free throughout the spring and summer with no boundaries of a traditional farm, and come the fall farmers work together to round up every sheep in the countryside. Then, they meet to divide the sheep according to the farmers who keep them and ensure they stay safe for the winter. In the spring, they are shorn and released back out again to roam and grow another season.

We visited the Glaumbær Turf Farm, one of the last in Iceland of its kind, where the homestead was literally built into hills in the earth for insulation and protection, long hallways connecting rooms for every function a family would need throughout each season. Larders, kitchens, laundry rooms, sitting rooms, spinning rooms, everything was accessible through internal passageways that eliminated the need to let in the cold. I loved those yellow doors! It makes me want to paint my front door yellow, but I doubt I could pull it off as well. Everyone in the household slept in one big room in bunk-style beds which was also where much of the women’s work, spinning and knitting and braiding horse hair and all of the essential crafts occurred. On our visit, it was actually a special exhibition day where actors representing women’s traditional crafts and costumes from many different eras of Iceland’s history came together and demonstrated their skills, and how it might be like to all live and work together in one place at the farm. Seeing this unfold, I was once again amazed at the resilience, resourcefulness, and determination of the Icelandic people. Their relationship with wool was born of necessity, but grew beyond subsistence into artistry and love. It was bitterly cold by my estimation on this spring day and it gave me a whole new appreciation for their way of life.

Wearing my plotulopi sweater!

We ate lunch (salad sandwiches, pasta salad, yogurt, OJ) and finished our journey to Skagafjörður, a tiny, sweet town on the northern coast. We toured the only tannery in Iceland, if you can believe it, considering all of their sheep, and visited a local grocery store to peruse their YARN (something we were all in disbelief about) but alas! We arrived at around 3:50 PM and this grocery, in a tiny town at the top of the world, closed at 4 PM on Saturday for the whole weekend. Despite our collective disappointment, I had to smile. Sometimes it felt as though traveling in Iceland was like traveling back to a simpler time. Of course, everyone has internet, and modern amenities, they travel and go to school and do so many things like I do. But here, the grocery store closes at 4 PM for the weekend, so you better get your goods before then because this grocer is getting a Sunday off. I love that defiance to our culture of needing everything right now.

That evening, Helene introduced me to and made everyone laugh with her obsession with the Eurovision. I can’t believe I’ve never heard of this before! It was terribly awesome. The performances lasted at least 2 hours and we went to bed an hour into the judging, and they were maybe a third of the way through. Hilarious. She also demonstrated how she blocks her shawl designs and showed us an entire trunk full of various Icelandic designs and techniques for shawls. The shawls were all Icelandic in tradition but original in design, each with a unique variation and color story. Lots of undulating lace patterns, natural gradients, triangles, and lace borders.

The entire next day, we knit. Helene shared with us the basics of spider lace, a simple pattern to follow, and let us loose with a bag of yarn. I don’t think I’ve ever knit that long, with that fine of a yarn, and enjoyed it so much. Before I knew it, three hours had passed. All of us, sitting in an old church and knitting for hours. Quite reminiscent of the women we had seen crafting away at Glaumbær. We broke for lunch, coffee and to begin planning out the yarns we wanted to bring home for various projects to make sure we got them the next day (our last day), and then continued knitting until dinner. The result? By the end of the day I had made a tiny, traditional shawl, and Helene had taught me how to block the heck out of it as lace should be blocked (as in, I thought I had blocked it aggressively, but Helene saw my work, removed half of my pins and nearly doubled the size of my shawl).

One of the good, wonderful realizations that I had on this trip was that every one of us on this trip approached making in a unique way. I find it so easy to become enamored with the “things” you “need” to knit - the culture, the brands, the American way of having a special bag and a special tool for each thing. I love those things, and I love supporting makers who elevate my crafting experience. I think it’s worth it to invest in the things that make you happy. But this trip reminded me that sometimes, all you need is a cooking pot to block lace, that you can knit a baby sweater on old, straight, aluminum needles if you like, and that some knitters never use patterns. My roommate Kris was one of those, and during the week we spent together she wore a different sweater each day - completely unique, completely designed by her based on ideas that she had collected on a Pinterest board and which fit her perfectly. I don’t even think she used Ravelry. When you take away everything else, the one thing we all had in common was the act of knitting, looping wool over wool. How great is that?

Never been so proud of something so small

Iceland: Part 4 (Knitting workshops and plotulopi)

Our country hotel was my favorite place that we stayed the whole week. Right off of the main road leading north, it was flanked on both sides by wide, hilly fields and mountains that were obscured by clouds. Cows, pigs, sheep, ducks, and chickens had their homes near the cottages covered with mossy roofs and two hot tubs overlooking the river. Our first lesson, which took place in a room behind the restaurant, involved all of the varieties of Icelandic wool and how they are made: the plotulopi, lettlopi, alafoss lopi, einband and everything else that Iceland has to offer.

For centuries , all of the wool raised in Iceland was cleaned by hand, combed by hand, and handspun extremely fine lace. Today, it is nearly impossible to find that kind of yarn unless you spin it yourself, and so a few years ago Helene worked to develop her own lace-weight single-ply Icelandic wool in the old traditional way. A century ago, women rarely wore coats or jackets to stay warm like we might assume in modern times, but instead would layer wool shawl upon wool shawl, plenty long and tied in the back for warmth. And warmth, as you can imagine, was of the utmost importance to make it through incredibly long winters.

We spent the morning cozy inside with plenty of coffee, working with plotulopi, playing around with lacy eyelet designs, several cast-on and color-changing techniques, broke for lunch, and picked it all back up again. Mid-afternoon we stopped for coffee and waffles (a tradition I would very much like to keep up in my every day life) and then had some free time to explore.

I took a hike up the mountain which turned out to be much more of an adventure than I had bargained for. As I passed each animal’s pens following the river towards the mountains, I realized that the pigs were following me along the length of their fenced pen. “How fun!” I thought, “They’re taking a walk with me!” And fun it was, until I realized that at the end of the pen, some pigs had dug a trench under their fencing and decided that they WOULD in fact go on a walk with me! Not normally scared of animals and knowing that pigs were not known to be aggressive, I was nevertheless alone and several hundreds of pounds of pigs were headed in my direction and at a fast clip. I quickly diverted my direction back towards the farm, just in case I needed to call for assistance, and the pigs continued to follow me at a distance. I found a grassy ledge off the path with a small pebbled path running in front, and much to my relief the pigs decided to continue along their path and towards, I am sure, a favorite pasture. Crisis averted.

Some hiking, some journaling, some dinner, and of course a pre-bedtime dip in the hot tub, followed by a dip in the icy cold and clear river. And as if the day couldn’t get any better, I found out late that evening that I had a new niece waiting for me back in the States and I got to Skype with Lila Kate on the day she was born just outside the restaurant, overlooking the mountains. It’s a moment I will never forget.

How I loved you, country hotel!

Iceland: Part 3 (Borgarnes and sights along the way to Our Country Hotel)

The next morning, we were to meet Helene at 9 to get out of the city, and so the majority of us came down for breakfast around 8 AM. I met all of the ladies who would be journeying together: Brenda from the Netherlands, Pennie and Phillippa from the UK, Kris from Denmark, and Brigitte from France. I unknowingly outed myself as an American right away by eating an apple with peanut butter for breakfast (apparently a very American thing to do) and visited with everyone a little bit before collecting our things to load up!

Helene arrived in the most beautiful green cardigan and lacy shawl, exclaiming that she dressed for spring but couldn’t believe how hot it was (this was a theme of the week, apparently temperatures in the 50s in May were QUITE unusual for Iceland. We saw a few lupines on our drive that day and she was so surprised, she couldn’t believe it.) Our small crew loaded on a small tourist bus and began the drive towards Highway 1, which loops all the way around the country. As we drove, Helene told us all about the geologic history and answered a bunch of our questions about the history, culture, and agriculture of the country. A vast majority of the food that is eaten in the country is imported due to the harsh climate, but I was amazed at all that she shared about the ingenious ways that farmers have learned to cope with rocky soils, long winters, and an incredibly short growing season.

We were all, I think, taken aback by the views already. Whenever someone has asked me how I found Iceland since this trip, I always think of this moment on the first day when we drove out of Reykjavik. The plains, flat and grassy with almost no trees, giving away in a moment to towering, dark mountains whose peaks were completely obscured by the clouds. It made me think of God, and for a while I sat there in wonder at it all.

Of course, we were only just beginning. We stopped for our lunches, to be taken on the road, at a small cafe on the edge of Borgarnes and after travelling through the longest tunnel I think I have ever seen, which cuts across an enormous body of water and makes the journey just 45 minutes instead of 2.5 hours between the cities. The first day was a touring day, and we had a lot to see!

Our first stop after Borgarnes was to a farm owned by a lovely craftswoman named Rita, who had farmed all her life and spoke mostly Icelandic. She and her family raised sheep for many years and now focus mainly on dyeing and sheep-related crafts, including the making of buttons, needles, jewelry and tools out of Icelandic sheep horns. She had worked to source naturally-colored Icelandic fleeces beyond the traditional and easy-to-dye white in shades of fawn, chocolate, and even black. The purchases began. :) She also treated us to small glasses of bilberry juice, or wild blueberry juice, intensely sweet and delicious, while we spent some time on her homestead.

From Rita’s farm, we visited the country store and Wool Collective in the Borgarfjörður region. Composed entirely of individual artisans, makers, farmers, and dyers who directly benefit from the sales of their handcrafted wool goods, it was incredible, and a privilege to support. In an era of increasingly industrialized and outsourced souvenirs, I was very excited for the opportunity to directly support the people and crafts that made this country so special. A few naturally-dyed mini skeins made it into my shopping basket, each individually labeled with the person who dyed the wool, and the materials with which it was dyed. The region also boasts its own lopapeysa sweater completely original and representative of its culture which could only be purchased at the store. I love those little ducks!

After we had seen everything, and with promises of more treasures ahead, we drove to the home and studio of Gudrun Bjarnadóttir. Gudrun provided us with an in-depth history and look at her natural dye process to make her Hespa yarn. (This is a wonderful interview that Tolt Yarn & Wool did with Gudrun a few years ago.) A botany professor by trade, Gudrun began naturally dyeing Icelandic wool using traditional methods that combined all of her interests and passions. She taught us all about how she learned how to adapt traditional methods for a modern kitchen (subbing ammonia for sheep’s urine, for example) and her love of the craft. In her pots that day were yarns being dyed with Icelandic moss (actually a lichen), lupine leaves, rhubarb root and some non-native species that have a long history in Iceland including madder, indigo and cochineal.

Gudrun was so patient and attentive to our questions, and you could tell she has a real passion and a love for Iceland, its history, and her craft. She joined us for our bakery lunch of sandwiches with ham and hardboiled eggs (a new cuisine for me, but not for my European counterparts), fried “love balls” (donuts with raisins and cardamom) and an iced Danish. Her studio door opened up to more mountain views, chickens walking around contentedly, and a cool breeze. I could have stayed there forever. It was so special for me to see how deeply rooted natural dyeing is to the culture and history of Iceland and made my own experiences with natural dyes in my kitchen at home seem much more connected to a larger history and culture of extracting beauty from nature for our day-to-day lives.

In Iceland, one of the best and craziest things I figured out while traveling is how you can be on your way to some destination, and just so happen to be in the same vicinity as a waterfall fed by a northern glacier that was originally carved in its place by lava flows. (Is this real life?) So was the case with Husafell. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

Our final stop for the day (as if the day had not already been one of the most incredible of my life) was at the Háafell goat farm. Goats, we would come to learn, have been largely persecuted and under-resourced in a country obsessed with sheep, almost to the point of Johanna. 16 years ago, Johanna made it her mission to save these animals and thanks to her incredible determination, a well-timed Indiegogo campaign and Game of Thrones, the goats survive to this day. In fact, a new baby goat had just been born a few hours before our arrival.

Just outside our lodging for the next few days, an incredible crater that we climbed to the top and where we squished our hands in the most lush moss you’ve ever seen.

Much earned at the end of our day, a beautiful meal in a restaurant where the sun never set and where we remarked on our exhilarating and exhausting day. The next day we would stay in our country hotel for the first day of our workshops!

Iceland: Part 2 (Reykjavik)

I flew from NC to Boston and then overnight to Reykjavik. Having little international travel experience (and none to Europe) I was surprised by the elegance of our stewardesses in their skirt suits and pill box hats, and the care afforded each passenger. Unfortunately, the man across the aisle from my seat decided to not wear shoes and eat a bag of potato chips for what felt like four straight hours. Ha! Awake at midnight and the window was completely dark, awake at 1:30 and impossibly the sky was the palest pink and blue, rising above the clouds. Awake again at 2 (really, 7:00 AM) and suddenly we went from what looked like a storm cloud to being on the ground in Iceland.

It is a strange thing to travel alone to a new place. You are constantly taking in new information, seeing everything, observing everything in case you need to get back to it later. It makes you tired, but it also heightens everything. The small joys cause you to smile. You feel extra grateful for a kind bus driver and the smile from your barista when you leave probably too big of a tip (conversion rate be damned).

Two buses, a big terminal and one heel flap later, I arrived at my guesthouse. I had never been more grateful for a nap at 8:30 AM. The bells of Hallgrimskirkja chimed outside my window as I drifted to sleep.

The whole first day in Reykjavik is a cold, wet, wonderful blur. It rained off and on in chilly bursts, and I zigzagged through the streets, walking everywhere and avoiding open spaces where the wind whipped fiercest. I ate my first Icelandic hot dog under a little awning near the stand, bought some fun items at the Flying Tiger (thanks for the recommendation, Kemper!). puzzled and admired for a solid half-hour at the Handknitting Association of Iceland. I braved the bus (quite easy, as it turned out) to and from Storkurinn, a delightful yarn store that felt like home. I ended the day at Resto and enjoyed the most delicious fish soup with extra helpings of crusty bread.

Reykjavik is a comparatively small city even by my small city standards, and it feels very trendy and nostalgic to me all at once. Walking around, you get the sense of progress and vibrancy without the feelings of overwhelming busyness. It was really nice.

I learn to recognize, spending an entire day alone, that I like my own company. That I can order a beer at a pub and eat some Icelandic pancakes and not feel out of place, or really lonely. It is a grand thing to know that you like you.

I met a few of my fellow travellers that evening when they came by to say hello, and I could barely sleep from excitement over getting to see so much more beyond what I had already seen in a day. The next day, we would head to the countryside!

Iceland: Part 1

It’s been over a month since I returned home from Iceland, the land of fire and ice. Over the past many months, the idea of a trip to Iceland went from dream, to wish, to risk, to reality, to memory, and my heart swells thinking of the incredible journey that I traveled to this mysterious country and within myself on either side of it.

In my last post, I mentioned how my experiences with anxiety have heightened significantly over the past year, and without going into too much detail, it was very much true of my life and experiences this winter. And yet - I had caught the travel bug last summer when B and I traveled to Montreal in July. The experience of going there changed me and built in me new desires to “go” that I wasn’t totally familiar or comfortable with in many ways. And yet. The idea of going to Iceland this year came to live in my mind. And of course, I followed the amazing Helene Magnusson for many years (she is THE Icelandic Knitter for goodness sakes). When I casually mentioned her and we talked about Iceland this spring, my amazing partner immediately responded “You have to go. That’s what you have to do.”

So on my birthday in February, I gave myself by far the biggest birthday present I had ever given myself and we pressed the button to book the Spring Knitting Retreat happening in mid-May in ICELAND. My heart was beating so fast. It didn’t even feel real to do it! But the closer and closer we got, the busier that I got at work this spring, the more I told people that I was going to Iceland in May by myself the more it felt real and the more I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to get to go. Actually, at this point, I was equal parts overwhelmed and terrified, if we’re being honest. I had spent a day in NYC alone, had done day trips outside of Durham, but flying across the Atlantic by myself to meet up with a group of total strangers in a country to which I had never traveled? Oh goodness.

The week that I was set to go was, of course, also one of the busiest weeks of my whole spring. There was so much going on at work, and in preparation to be gone for 9 days, that I barely had time to think, and I ended up packing my entire suitcase the night before. The day of my flight, I triple checked everything, went to work in the morning, and then came home to drive to the airport. My 60L backpack, full for the first time, weighed more than I anticipated and I almost fell over, adjusting to my center of gravity. I checked EVERYTHING one last time, my heart physically pounding, and got in the car to go. I was hot from the many layers I was wearing, preparing to go from 80 F to 40 F in the span of only 12 or so hours, and I nervously chatted with my driver the whole way. Of course, I ended up at the airport much too early, but I was on my way.

I was on my way!