My newest yarn-y obsession

Nine or so months ago DH and I went to Iceland as part of our summer vacation.  Fortunately we had the foresight to go prior to all this volcanic dust and ash mess so we were able to fly in and out with ease and didn’t have to inhale all kinds of nasty dust. 

I have to say, Iceland is one of my favourite places on the face of the planet.  The only things I didn’t like about the country were the baggage handling at the airport (yes, actually I do need my suitcase and its ENTIRE contents to be happy while traveling) and the prices of just about everything.  That aside, the people, the food, the countryside and the yarn are all awesome.  How can a knitter NOT love a country where you can buy wool in every fifth store?  And see everyone, young and old, wandering around in all those awesome Icelandic sweaters.  Plus, Icelandic wool is one of the few things excluded from the country’s VAT.  Clearly Icelanders are very enlightened people.

So it will come as no surprise that I came back with literally a suitcase full of Lopi .  To be more precise though,  it works out to  two sweater’s and two shawls worth of yarn.  And a pattern book.  Which I flip through regularly.  DH is getting the cover page sweater in shades of blue and I haven’t decided what one I’ll be knitting for me yet.

Now Lopi, and even Lett-Lopi, is not soft wool.  It’s pretty scratchy and hairy and probably pills like mad.  And those sweaters are big, bulky and probably not-so-flattering on my not-so-svelte figure.  I’m sure they are time consuming to knit too, especially for someone who avoids knitting with more than one colour like the plague.  But for some reason I cannot get them out of my head. 

I have since bought two more pattern books and I troll through the Lopi project pages on Ravelry all the time.  I go to the Istex web site on a weekly basis.  I fondle my Lopi.  I dream about Icelandic sweaters.  And I really need to get cracking on knitting them up.

I wonder though, do I love the sweaters so much because they are beautiful or do I love them because I loved Iceland so much?  In the end, it probably doesn’t matter.

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