Brown Hat in Nalbinding (Nålbindning)

Making hats is a god way to try new stitches in nalbinding. The stitch used this time is often called "Dalby". I found a good description of it in the book "Gamla textila tekniker i ull" by Kerstin Gustafsson. It is described in a chapter called "Nålbindning efter Maj" (Nalbinding according to Maj). The stitch is common in the Dalby-area in the north of Värmland, Sweden.

The yarn used is a loosely spun single in 100 % wool, "Samo" from Marks & Kattens. I found it a little too loose, but I got used to it. This finished result is OK and dense enough to be warm and cosy.

I made the hat "long" enough so that one can fold the bottom part of it into a cuff, to get more warmth.

When it was finished I dyed it brown, and I am very pleased with the result. I found the Dalby stitch easy to execute. Done with a thinner yarn it would probably also make excellent mittens.

Hat in nalbinding (nålbindning)

I bought fantastic yarn from Wålstedts that I wanted to test for nalbinding. It is a s-plied, 2-ply, rather thick (Nm 3/2) yarn. I needed a very warm hat so I used the yarn double while making it. The result is dense and almost wind proof. I had decided to let let the structure of the stitches show.

To get a denser result I wrapped the yarn around the needle instead of the thumb. That way I did not need to full it afterwards. The stitch I used is number one in Westman´s book "Nålbindning - 12 varianter"

Dyeing yarn for nalbinding

Time again for dyeing yarn. I have bought some yarn for nalbinding from Wålstedts (seen to the right in the picture below) and I decided to dye some of it. I also had some embroidery yarn from Rauma in natural white (seen to the left in the picture below) that I wanted to dye red, green and yellow.

The yarn from Wålstedt was grey - and I dyed it green. Dyeing on grey yarn is a favourite of mine. The result is often much more interesting than dyeing white yarn. The Rauma yarn is a very thin 2-ply spaelsau and I plan to (some time in the future) use it to decorate mittens in nalbinding).

Nalbinding (Nålbindning)

It was time again for nalbinding. I really like nalbinding - it feels so genuine and the process is so repetitive and calming. It was more than a year ago since I did some nalbinding. Since I do not want to forget how to do it I decided to make a hat.

I found some old 2-ply wool in my stash that I could "risk" (it is not possible to rip back nalbinding, so if I messed up the yarn would be lost).

This time I decided not to full the finished hat. To compensate for that (I still want a warm hat) I had to bind it tighter than usual. The stitch is "Norrtälje", a.k.a. "Brodén". It is surprisingly warm. It took 70 grams of yarn in total.

"Uzorne Viazane Komi" and other books on Komi traditions and patterns

Since a recent project was the Komi Cap I decided to write about some books containing information about the Komi tradition, people and patterns.

My absolute favourites are two books by Galina Nikolaevna Klimova: "Uzorne Viazane Komi" (Knitted Patterns of the Komi) 1978, and "Tekstil´nyi ornament Komi" (Komi Textile Ornamentation) 1984. 

They are in Russian, which means that  most of the information in the text is lost to me, but they contain a lot of charts that make up for that. Very hard to find copies of these books.

In the book "Finno-Ugric Folk Art", 1977, by Istvàn Rász there is interesting information regarding many Finno-Ugric people, no knitting patterns though.

If you want to know more about the Komi religion, mythology, traditions and rites you should read "Encyclopaedia of Uralic Mythologies - Komi Mythology". The English edition is based on the Russian original from 1999 (Russian Academy of Sciences, Uralic Department, Komi Scientific Center Institute of Language, Literature and History, Ministry of Culture and Higher Education of the Republic of Komi).

"The Encyclopaedia of Uralic Mythologies is a descriptive and analytic compendium of the mythologies of the people speaking the Uralic languages - from the Lapps in Northen Europe and up to the Selkups and Nganasans in Siberia. The people of the Uralic linguistic family being the aborigines of the Eurasiatic North survived a long and complicated history and preserved their original religious and mythological traditions, where traces of primitive beliefs and archaic religious systems (e.g. shamanism) merge into ancient influences (e.g. the Indo-Iranian and Ancient Germanic) and into the later impacts of modern religions. ...."

And then Charlene Schurch: "Mostly Mittens, Traditional Knitting Patterns from Russia´s Komi People". This book has also been called "Knitting Marvelous Mittens, Ethnic Designs from Russia" and "Mostly Mittens. Ethnic Knitting Designs from Russia, Revised Edition" in later editions. There are lots and lots of nice patterns here.