Today is mihklipäev (Michaelmas), one of the important days in Estonian Folk Calendar.

Mihklipäev marked the end of summer, the summer work should have been finished by then. A sheep was slaughtered on mihklipäev and it's meat prepared for a harvest feast. They also brewed beer and cooked lots of food for the feast. Besides celebrating the harvest feast and the end of summer work they also celebrated the end of summer worker's contracts. People went to Michaelmas Fairs and to pubs.

The village social life picked up speed after the Michaelmas and the high season of weddings begun.

Excerpt translated from Estonian Vikipeedia.

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After ripping the stocking #2 and reknitting the clocks and the heel I decided to knit a test foot. This time using big light yarn so I can see what's going on. This is the result:

The heel looks wrong because the yarn is thick, but it fits perfectly. When it's not worn it also buckles exactly like the original. I slipped the first stitch of every heel row and picked up one stitch per two rows (one st per sl1.)

The foot (after the heel) can be divided into three parts: gusset, foot and toe. In the original the gusset decreases take 21% (of the foot length) being themselves 30% long. The foot decreases and increases take 49% and the toe takes 30% of the foot length. In my test the gusset decreases are too long.

Another feature that differs from modern socks, is that the top of the foot has less stitches than the bottom. It means the decreases at the toe are tricky, but with a little bit of math they shouldn't be too hard to figure out. Sigh. I hate math. I tried to get the foot proportions right by just knitting, but it didn't work. So, math it is. I should have calculated the percentages in the first place, but... Have I told you I hate math?

One thing I got right was the balance between top and bottom and the angle of foot increases. The toe needs more tweaking, especially the beginning and the balance between decreases and grafting.

I can't decide should I knit another foot to test the calculations or should I trust my equasions and continue with stocking #2?

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I figured it out! Yay! I'm basing the Landsknecht stockings I'm knitting on stocking of Kurfürsten August von Sachsen, with help from the pictures of Duke Barnim's stockings and the knit hose pattern published in 1655 (R. Rutt "A History Of Hand Knitting").

I figured out how to make the von Sachsen style clocks and heel. Unfortunately there are no pictures because the AHA! moment resulted ripping back to the beginning of the clock. The heel was fine, but because of the gussets I needed to fix one little detail with the clock. I'm hoping I'll conquer the puzzle of the gusset decreases and increases over the weekend too.

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Today R begun to study Estonian, I am impressed and proud of him. There are four guys in the class, three of whom have Estonian girlfriends and one has Estonian mom. Apparently this class is very rare because there are so few people wanting to take it. R got lucky — another guy in the class has been waiting for it for two years. This English-Swedish-Estonian-Finnish mix of languages in this relationship is going to be fun and frustrating.

Yesterday at the museum I spotted something I might make for my medieval sewing kit.

Viking age thread winders. They are not entirely correct for my 15th or 16th century persona, but they are better than nothing. The upper one is similar to the ones I've seen that have been claimed as medieval. I think they are made from leather, not wood. If I can find suitable leather and don't give in and buy some thread reels first, I might make a few.

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Today's museum trip was fun, we went to Historiska museet and I took about 100 photos of textiles and other interesting medieval stuff.

I also bought some pony beads to add to the braids. So this is how the braids look now:

I really like how the few blue ones look among the black. I'm not so sure about the beads, though. What do you think? Will the beads go or stay?

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I wanted to post a picture of my new braids today, but the weather didn't cooperate. All I can do is to tell you that they are fabulous and I love them a lot. Even more than the first (and last) ones I had. The fake hair the two Kenyan girls used now is different than what the hairdressers used in Estonia. It is much softer, silkier and it burns instead of melting.

I've got 166 thin braids, it took them 8 hours with breaks and a quick dinner. My scalp is a little tender still, but I won't have a bad hair day for the next 4 months, which makes it worth all the pain. There are a multitude of ways to style the braids — put them up, let them down, braid them, put them in ponytails or make formal 'dos. Have I told you how much I love the braids? Jätte mycket! A great deal. I promise to shut up about braids now.

Yesterday I decided to check Bloglines out. The result is that I transferred all blogs on my reading list that have a feed there. I like how easy it is to see in one glance who have updated. I also set up a feed for The Innocent Abroad and got a subscribe button from Bloglines.

Setting up the feed with Blogger was incredibly easy: just provide a folder on your server and a filename. It's that simple.

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I'm so exited! I'm going to get my hair braided tomorrow! All-black waist length braids with blue braids at the temples. It's going to be a looooong day, but the results are going to be so worth it. I can't wait!

The first Alhambra Sock is finished! I hope I can still call it an Alhambra Sock with all the mods I made...

I loved the stitch pattern, it is easy to memorize, but you also need to pay attention. Otherwise the lace may not zig and zag, it might only zig or only zag. (Don't ask me how much I had to rip!) As always, I couldn't leave things alone and substituted heels and toes. I didn't continue with the lace down the foot because I was afraid it might be too loose.

Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with the pattern, it is excellent. Being an Estonian I just might be genetically unable to follow the whole thing. This beauty of a pattern can be found here, on Ryan's (the author) blog.

I'm off to cast on for the second one. Have a nice weekend!

P.S. Please forgive all the exclamation marks, I couldn't contain myself.

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I have almost finished the first Alhambra Sock.

This is the loot from yesterday.

A better pic of Making Waves Socks of Six Sox Knitalong.

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Today's shop-hopping trip was a success. We went to a lot of stores, all blurred together now. If I think really hard, I could even find a couple of them again. There were fabric stores, notions stores, paper stores, crafts stores, museums and a library. I was being good and didn't buy much, only some merino wool to spin, a bottle for scented water, an envelope for a gift and a piece of the most beautiful burgundy leather for book cover. The pictures will follow when the sun shines again. I most valiantly resisted buying three or four books I really wanted, because they won't go anywhere. ... I hope.

Where was I? Ah, yes. We are planning to go to a couple of interesting museums next Tuesday because today we just visited the museum shops. We'll see if I can actually take pictures inside, some museums are touchy about photos.

I also took some pictures while we were walking around.

A fairytale castle smack in the middle of Stockholm's city center.

A garden beside one of the oldest bathing houses Centralbadet, built in 1904. It is a few steps off Drottninggatan, which is "the" shopping street in Stockholm.

Tonight was also the first time I went to the D-level class. I changed the time I go to school to night time*, because I'm still hoping to get the job and it felt right to change the time while changing groups. It went very well — I like the teacher and the students I met were nice, there were some linguistic challenges, but I found I can communicate in swedish now. This day has been very good, I'm tired, but happy.

* There are four basic times one can go to this sfi school: morning, day, afternoon and night. The night class begins at 6PM.

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The albums with photos I shot at Kolmården Zoo are finally up! Go and check them out, the link is on my sidebar.

Some of our friends had an impromptu fighters' practice today and I snapped some pictures.

Constance vs Marcus.

Raven vs Franz.

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New Knitty is out, there's some seriously good stuff there this time. Leaves and Waves and Unbiased are irresistible, Zig Zag is fabulous, but probably wouldn't fit my body type. The idea of Unbiased is brilliant, although when I make it I'll substitute yarn.

R's brother got married on Friday.

Here's the happy couple after the ceremony.

While R was away at his brother's bachelor party on Wednesday a couple of my new girl friends came over. We chatted, drank tea and I knitted on Alhambra Socks. We had loads of fun and this Wednesday we'll go out fabric hunting.

The ever-changing gauge on Alhambra Socks makes things interesting. Over the lace it is 9 sts per inch, over the straight stockinette on foot it is 10 sts per inch. The sock fits perfectly everywhere.

The landsknecht stockings fit! At least they fit another friend whose measurements match closely the recipient's. Since I need to test-knit the clocks anyway, I'll begin his (recipient #2) fighting stockings immediately I've finished the first Alhambra Sock. We made a trade: he'll make me some bone replica sewing needles and I'll knit him a pair of hose for fighting. They will be made from Novita yarn 7 brothers in black. 7 brothers is superwash and will respond better to occasional ripping than the fine wool I'm using for the first pair. Also, I can use 3 mm needles instead of 2 mm ones. At the same time I'll cast on for the second Landsknecht stocking of the first pair and knit it down to the ankle. So I'll have this pair ready for the clocks once I've figured them out. That's the plan anyway, we'll see what really happens, the second Alhambra Sock has to fit in there somewhere too.

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The test results are in: I passed!

I got maximum points in hearing and reading, made three mistakes in writing and phrases, and only four mistakes in knowledge of Sweden. Only four because I was afraid I'd failed this section miserably.

Update: I realized that I should also tell which test I passed. It was an official level test in Swedish. I'm learning Swedish at a course provided by SFI — Swedish For Immigrants (svensk för invandrare). The course is divided to levels and after each level you must take a test to see if you're ready for the next one. At the end of the last level, there is another test (Nationella Provet). If one passes that, they are at the same level Swedes are after High School. I passed the level that precedes the last one.

To beef this entry up a little, here's a sunset in Stockholm in July.

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Look, what arrived today!

A Nordic Secret Friend package from Nanna.

Inside the package were candles, chocolate and very deliciously aromatic tea. Nanna says the tea comes from the oldest tea shop in Europe, opened in 1835. Thank you, Nanna! I love Earl Grey and I love candles. I have not thought of to combine the two with chockolate, but I will definitely do so now.

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Malvina has got a few new things in her wardrobe. The evenings are getting longer and chillier, a girl must prepare against winter.

Here's Malvina showing off her big comfy raglan...

... posing in a fiery tube skirt...

... and of course every girl must have a loopy mohair poncho.

Playing with these dolls is tons of fun, I wish my wardrobe was so well stocked for coming winter!

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