Inspiration from Grandma's attic

Grandma Eivor was a crafty and hands on woman. Her life was never easy, working as a maid in a house hold when she was young. Later she married a man who wasn't the best man on the planet, but she stuck by his side (and his drinks and temper but hardly ever had a schnaps herself...) until he one day dropped dead. She raised a boy to her best abilities - my stepfather. She was a working hard woman, but I can only remember her as a Grandma - retired but busy from early morning until late night always on the go and accomplishing things.

She went fishing, cleaned her fish and cooked it. She picked blueberries, cooked jam and served it with our pancakes. And every now and then we could find a plastic bowl filled with fresh wild raspberries on our door step when coming home from school. We ate them with heavy cream and sugar.

Love and adore rag rugs of all sorts!

She ripped our old bed sheets into strips and weaved rag rugs that told a story on our wooden floors. She made needle point cushion covers and wall hangings with traditional flower motives.

One of Eivor's crochet blankets.

Eivor's blanket in Tilda yarn colors: 071-Denim, 005-Cream, 033-Yellow, 048-Fuschia, 046-Dark red.
Available in my Yarn Shop.

She crocheted the most lovely bed spreads and table runners in every color and seasonal theme imaginable. She knitted socks and hats and cardigans and full on ugly slip overs... 70's style... She wasn't very talkative, more of a hands on maker. Baking cookies every week, giving it us who lived in a new built villa next door on her large property. Every Monday we knew the cookie cupboard was stocked up to its brim with delights...

In fall she picked baskets of mushrooms, in spring she picked elderberry flowers to make syrup. She made rowan berry jelly to serve with Sunday roasts. She solved cross words on a rainy day, always served coffee in delicate coffee cups with flowers on. She had a single bed with a knitted patchwork blanket in the room next to the kitchen where she took a nap to recharge after lunch.

She loved cats and had a number of them running in and out through her kitchen window, ringing their window bell for attention if she was not in the room. Her flower beds were colorful with amix of perennials and wild flowers. She chopped and stacked her own wood and lit a fire every day no matter what weather.

One of my stepfather's properties.

I would love to have a kitchen like this in my stepfather's property.

Vintage wall papers - oh my how pretty!

I didn't really know her that well to be honest. But when asked to see if "there is anything you want" of the remainders from her household at one of my stepfather's properties attic, I somehow felt like I got to know her for the first time. Maybe because I now share the love of hand crafts and home makes just like she did.

Eivor's crocheted rug.

I found a bag of crochet samples and yarn balls, doilies and pretty embroidery. A crocheted rug in a typical Scandinavian design. The old child sized harmonica I used to play on as a kid and much much more. I would have brought so many things with me back home if it wasn't impossible to fit it into a travel bag... And when writing this blog post I realize that Eivor has influenced my life quite a lot. She is definitely representing a lot of my Swedish roots, style and interest in artisan crafts.

Eivor's crocheted potholders.

But what I squeezed into my luggage was these. Grandma Eivor's potholders in different shapes and sizes. They inspired me to reconstruct the pattern for one of them (the middle one) and once I got that done more design ideas based on the same idea came along and the Vintage Potholder Pattern was born. It will be released this weekend. I hope you will enjoy it.

Kärlek
Annette

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