what i wove this year

we're closing in on the end of the year. what a shitshow this year has been, watching that spray-tanned satan and his band of evildoers dismantle everything good about the country of my birth is disheartening to say the least. so i'd much rather focus on something positive and creative. like everything that i wove this year!

i started off with tea towels for husband's eldest. we made the warp just before the end of 2024 and i finished them up february 19. 11 finished tea towels! they were made in colors she requested. i managed to make a few of them more my style by going for a madras plaid look adding some orange and red. i keep one from every warp for myself, as a memory of what i've woven. she got six of them and the rest were sold or given as gifts.

on april 5, we created the warp for taylor swift's lover album, starting my quest to weave all of taylor swift's albums as tea towels. i wanted it to sparkle like the lover bodysuit and sparkle it did! i think emmy, my weaving mentor, wanted to talk me out of it, but in the end, we are both glad she didn't. it took awhile, but i finished the warp on may 18. 13 finished tea towels!

on may 24, i started right in on the next album - reputation. it was quite the departure for me to work in black and white and grey, rather than a colorful warp. i broke up the monotony a bit by weaving in a bit of red and green sparkle. i also had a different kind of silver and black sparkle thread in the warp, but it didn't behave nearly as well as the sparkle thread i used in the lover warp. lesson learned there! i took them off the loom june 28. i got 13 finished tea towels from this warp, though there are only 10 in this photo. i had to weave some extra ribbon for the straps, so the last three weren't finished yet in this photo. 

on june 29, we already made the next warp - i took a break from the taylor swift project to weave a good long summery warp that i called rainbow sherbet. i finished it already on august 9 - 21 tea towels! unfortunately, they're already gone - as gifts and one person bought six of them for christmas presents! husband's middle daughter also got six of them for her kitchen. i wove in with some sparkly threads and all the ones she chose had those. 

then the loom rested while i went on a week-long weaving course at skals, where i wove 8 small test weavings with 8 different techniques. i didn't want to put a new warp on the loom in case i learned something that i wanted to try out immediately when i got home. there are two that i will do for future warps in my eras tour project.

on august 24, it was back to my taylor swift eras project. we made the warp for speak now. i had the yarn for that one is more or less why that album was the next one. i've actually not gotten very far on this one, so i can't show the finished product yet. i chose to play with what's called "color effect" and i can feel that i'm already bored with it before i'm even really started. 

i have to pull myself together and get to work on it. this was just the end, where i get the warp started and try weaving a bit with all of the colors to see how they look together. as you can see, i've tried a couple of sparkle threads as well to amuse myself. i have a stack of these weavings to make small bags/purses out of, but i have to make any. instead, i've turned to knitting of late, though not on my christmas sweater that should have been finished last christmas, but more about that in a knitting wrap-up post. 

i did finish one more thing on the little loom in 2025. i took a new rag rug runner for the kitchen off the loom november 19. i've come a long way in my weaving ability since i did the first one down in randbøldal 5 years ago. it looks so nice, i really love it! there's still 6-7 meters of warp on the little loom, to make some more rugs, so i just have to tear up some old duvet covers and get going. this one took me most of the year - i can see in my photos (that daily photo project is still coming in handy), that i started this one february 9. it was a bit tedious, laying in each strip of fabric and making them meet and lay just right. but that's why it's nice to have two looms, so you can move between projects according to what you feel like doing. 

i got some wool ready to try my hand at making a proper wool rug on that warp, but have made two attempts and am not keen on it, so i frogged it back again (not sure it's called frogging when you weave) and i'm not sure what i will make next. probably another rag rug with some old duvet covers in shades of pink and green that i can use in the bedroom. 

a total of 58 tea towels and one four-meter long rug woven this year. if i'd kept up my head of steam, it could have been more, but weaving just takes the time it takes and that's a big part of what i love about it. 

reading can take you anywhere

i had a most interesting conversation with husband's eldest this evening. she is consciously cultivating an interest in reading. she joined a book club, she went to a book forum (bookcon?), and has even already bought tickets to next year's edition of the same. she had a terrible teacher early in her primary school years, so this is a brand new interest and one she's choosing intentionally. i admire her for that. 

she asked me what i like to read. i said, "everything." and that's mostly true. of course, i have things i like better than others. i can reread/re-listen to the mrs. pollifax novels endlessly. but i did study russian literature, so reading has always been a very big interest for me. 

still, i found it hard to recommend books to her. she said what she likes best is what's called "fagliteratur" in danish. which means non-fiction, specific topic-related stuff. she was reading a book called "tarme med charme" (which means, loosely translated, "the charm of the intestines," which oddly rhymes in danish). she admitted she wasn't keen on the style of the book. i could have told her that from the overly cutesy title. ugh. 

i recommended murakami, some of the james bond novels written post ian fleming, but sanctioned by his estate (anthony horowitz and kingsley amis come to mind), danish author solvej balle, who just had a great feature in the nytimes, and gabriel garcia marquez. i tried to describe some of the books to her, but then she said she had trouble with fiction because, "what should i use that for?" 

i was stymied by that response. what can i say? there's nothing you can't use it for. you can use it for everything. you can use it for how to live your life. you can use it to open you to the world and experiences you wouldn't otherwise experience. you can use it to cry, to laugh, to process what you think about the world. i tried to express that to her, but it wasn't easy. and it oddly sounded a bit vague. 

how can you tell someone that books can transport them to worlds they would never have imagined if that part of their imagination isn't turned on? what book would it take to turn it on? how do i take her from the charms of the intestines to lincoln in the bardo or quichotte? or the wind-up bird chronicle? 

it's so encouraging that she wants to read to expand her horizons, but what's the best way in that takes baby steps, but opens up a world that hasn't previously been open?

thank you, molly!

this week, i stopped by a random stranger's house, which is near my work in aarhus, to pick up a little parcel from my bloggy friend molly. it's a small world. a friend in south africa who i've never met in person, but who feels like one of my oldest friends, 🫶 sends an envelope for me with someone she's working with who happens to live in denmark. and it totally brightened my day in this dark time of year. it's a lovely blank book, a sticker, some tags, a cool capetown patch and a notebook that can stick to the refrigerator. i will smile and think of molly every time i see these things and use them. and i will be grateful all over again for this space and the whole bloggy universe, even if it isn't what it once was. i hope this friend of molly's work will take her back to capetown so i can return the favor. and if that's the case, molly, i hope you like taylor swift tea towels. 😘

this week in seven senses

i enjoy reading the seven senses substack. the seven senses are the ones that come to mind - see, hear, taste, touch, smell, plus two that are a little more thought-provoking - balance and envision. i decided to try my hand at noting down something from those 7 senses that i experienced this week. it seems like a noble exercise. 

see

i stopped by arken, a modern art museum south of copenhagen. i wanted to see this  lærke bagger popup. lærke bagger is a famous danish knitter who has written two books that are part knitting pattern book and part autobiography. the sweaters in the photo are her "inner child" sweater, knitted by people all over denmark (and probably the world). each knitted with their own colors and their own stories. i didn't knit one (yet), but i'm impressed by those who did. anytime you gather a bunch of similar things together, it's impressive. there are so many stories there in those fibers, you could feel the energy of them all in the room. 

there was another exhibition there by an artist called kenneth rasmussen. he has a manic need to knit plastic bags and it resulted in this amazing installation. doing your obsession in a huge quantity can really turn into something. that's quite reassuring to a person who has currently made it her mission to weave all of taylor swift's albums as tea towels. 

hear

what i'm listening to is a bit mainstream, but that's just how it is. i can't get enough of taylor swift's life of a showgirl. i listen on repeat and i play the songs in order and i don't skip any. my current favorite is elizabeth taylor. but i also really like opalite. i feel like i'm officially a real swiftie now and this one will be my album. i can't wait to weave it.

taste

i made this yuzu curd for some cupcakes i took to a gathering with my old colleagues. it's yuzu season and i ordered two boxes from freshland. it's such a delicate flavor. the cupcakes went over well. and i just ordered one more box. the season is short and i absolutely love the citrus perfume-y taste. i might even go non-traditional and do a yuzu pavlova for thanksgiving. 

touch

this is a little twist of what's left of a warp that was made by a weaver named anne grete buhl. i'm not even sure what she made of out of it, but now i have her loom and some of her weaving yarn. these are silk fibers and i love the colors. and i love how they feel in my hand. i'm sure they contain a story. and now i get the chance to continue that story. 

smell

i'm finding smell to be hard. for one thing, there's no good photo for it. as we opened all of the boxes today from anne grete's home, it released a stale old house smell into the room. they had been in her empty house and she died a number of months ago, so i suppose that's natural. she was battling cancer in her final years and no doubt it developed over that time too. the loom i got from her also smelled like smoke. she had smoked for many years and it had penetrated the loom. i spent hours this summer, cleaning it and scrubbing off all of the nicotine. i wondered at one point if we should just make a bonfire, but i think it's more or less ok now. i think the fibers and fabrics can also be freshened up. 

balance

i've had a few situations recently that have upset or frustrated me. i endured a long drive where the main topic was boring car-related talk. like about the best way to take care of your brakes as well an extensive discussion of the switch from summer to winter tires. towards the end of it (i had forgotten my airpods, so i was trapped in the back seat where it was difficult to contribute (what would i have said anyway?) but impossible to tune it out), i thought about opening the door and jumping out. it was that bad. then last friday, one of the same colleagues made two outrageously sexist comments during a presentation. he thought he was being funny. but it wasn't. it's 2025 and he's a director. totally inappropriate. anyway. the point of these dumb stories is that coming home and hanging out with molly can make it all better. she is my balance. 

envision

my sister snapped this picture of the northern lights this week from the yard of our childhood home in south dakota. the sun has been crazy active and so the auroras were strong. alas, it was too cloudy here in denmark, so i didn't get to see any, but man, have i enjoyed her photos. i feel like they could inspire a weaving. look at those amazing colors! 

weekend getaway

our local creative group went on our yearly trip down to the bottom lefthand corner of denmark - højer. (is that how we're supposed to describe a country? i think maybe the picture in my head is too related to the map.) we've been going for quite some years now. there's an affordable big old house we can rent where we can all sleep (it sleeps 13) and an atelier where we can paint and dance and make a mess. and we did all of that. plus making ourselves some lovely food and drinking slightly too much wine and snaps and something called a half bitter that tasted a bit like christmas.  four of the ladies are in their 80s and they are all super cool and fun, each in their own way. i hope to be as curious, funny and spry as they all are should i reach their age. 

one of them painted this watercolor of some members of the group when we went to the beach. i had immediately gone down towards the water, so i'm not in this one. i was wearing clothes that blended into the landscape anyway. 

we all go on these weekends needing something different. some need companionship and people to talk to. some need a break and a change of scenery. i think we all want to be creative. we all bring too many materials. i took four knitting projects (i worked on 3 of them), some watercolors, some journals, fabric and hand-dyed embroidery wool and my linoleum cutting tools. i had no idea what i would want to work on. i think what i ultimately wanted to work on was the food that i made. i bought some beautiful raviolis at the italian supermarket in copenhagen and made three different sauces for them for everyone to enjoy on friday. 

of course, i found myself wanting to work on a knitting project that i hadn't brought along. that's the way it always is. you think you're bringing all the options you have then your brain thinks of something new when it can't have it. at least i restrained from buying new yarn. and that in spite of visiting a yarn shop! all i brought home were sausages from the local butcher and enough renewed energy from all the laughter to last the week.

the emerald jade bathroom

remember that cool floor we got in what's now my weaving studio? now there's one in our upstairs bathroom as well! we're thinking of it as the emerald jade room now! it just went in this morning, so it's not even dry yet. i'll share more photos when it is dry. we're going to leave this one high gloss (we think). soon we'll have a full bathroom that we can use! i can't wait! the never-ending house project marches forward. 

weaving secret messages

i'm not sure if i've mentioned this here, but husband is the kind of guy who is utterly unafraid to rethink things. so after we added the new roof a few years ago, he decided to move the stairs to get to the second floor from where he had originally thought they would be. this involved building a couple of extra meters onto the back of the house. as one does. but it being a rather large undertaking and him being a one-man show, he has discovered that they don't match up 100% as accurately as he would have liked. he thinks this can be hidden by covering that portion of the ceiling with a really cool weaving. 

as one has the weaving bug, i am on board with this, so i am very deep in planning what said weaving should look like. it's not a tiny undertaking, as it's 166cm wide and about 6 meters long. times two. so needless to say, i am looking for inspiration, as i'm still a baby weaver. i know that my loom can handle whatever i throw its way, as it's much more experienced and wise than i am. 

i have this idea that whatever i weave, needs to contain a secret, meaningful message. and since i've been spending a lot of time in the studio, working on a podcast for work, it hit me that it would be possible to weave sound waves. they would look like a cool pattern and if you knew what it represented, it would also contain a message. since that occurred to me, i can't shake the idea. i recorded a meaningful message in the studio the other day and took a photo of the sound wave. i think it has potential.

i ordered up a bunch of weaving books from the library. this one about danish weaver bodil bødtker-næss had some very interesting inspiration in it. it was all i could do not to write and underline everywhere in the book, but i did restrain. i've definitely got to order this one so that i can write in my own copy.

and fold down a bunch of pages, like this one. she wove panels to divide a big open office space for danske bank back in the 70s. they don't look entirely unlike sound waves, eh?

this one could also have a sound wave vibe.

and this one definitely does. i don't think i will directly copy any of these, but they do give me some ideas for how i could approach this. combined with the idea of mounting a weaving on a wooden frame, which i saw at hanne vedel's workshop, i think an idea is forming. but i've yet to settle on a color scheme. i'm doing a few watercolor sketches to try to work out some ideas. i think husband will even build a tiny miniature version of the frames we might want to mount the weavings on, so we can create a paper version. 

i made a test sheet with all of my potential colors. i got some cool gansai tambi japanese watercolors to play with. 

the planning is half the fun. but husband is impatient for me to get started. i'm not even sure yet what kind of yarn to use - linen? wool? cotton? it's quite the adventure.

danish weaver hanne vedel

the amazing danish weaver hanne vedel, who is 94 and still weaving, held an open house during the autumn holiday last week. we went to visit her. she was taught to weave by cis fink, one of the classic old danish weaving teachers who originally owned my loom. this photo above is of hanne vedel on the left and emmy, my personal weaving teacher and the one who gave me my loom, which once belonged to cis fink. i feel so privileged to have met hanne vedel and even more privileged to own a loom with such history. 

hanne vedel is one of the most prolific and famous danish weavers of the 20th century. this is a bolt of cloth that she wove for the curtains for the upgrade of the trustee council chamber (also known here in denmark as the finn juhl chamber) at the UN building in new york. so simple, but so beautiful. 

we spent nearly two hours at her studio, just looking at everything and being inspired. this wall hanging gave me an idea for some weavings that i want to do for our home (more about that in another post soon).

i need to weave some long panels for a steeply vaulted wall above our stairs and i've been pondering how we could fix them to the wall so that they don't sag. this might be a way to approach it. 

this work looked different, depending on the angle you stood in relation to it. i'm not sure my project will be able to do that because you can never get up high enough to look at it from the one angle, but it was inspiring nonetheless.

i sent husband past her studio on the monday after our visit, so that he could look at the frame this piece was mounted on. now i just have to figure out my version. 

hanne vedel is still actively weaving. she had projects set up on two looms. this one, involving horse hair, was also super inspiring. i have so many ideas now and not enough time or enough looms to execute them all!

now i just need to find someone with a horse that wants to trim its mane or tail. 

look how lovely that it is! simple but beautiful.

hanne vedel had run spinderigaard, a spinnery, for many years and so i scored some lovely wool and silk cones. it's enough to make a lovely scarf or something. i love those greenish speckles. i got some with black speckles as well. 

 

a first look at stitched journeys

my dream of a tiny house built out of my great grandmother's quilts is now a reality! i will put a couple of small stools in there and on the day of the exhibition, i plan to (i hope) record people's stories of their own journeys. more about this soon. i'm exhausted from two days of setting up the whole exhibition. we have more than 60 works this year and it looks really great! i'm working on a video that will show everything. we just have to put on a few finishing touches on the exhibition before it's ready. it's a good one! people were clearly inspired by our theme of the journey starts here.