Bergen Crafts

Bergen, Norway is cold, not only in the winter, with its sea breeze and northern location, so it makes sense that I found a lot of felted wool and knitted hats, mittens, and socks in the market stalls. Bright colors chase the gloomy rain and snow away and fun designs make them, um, fun. :) Check out the pieces I found.

Seven Sisters

Okay, this has nothing to do with quilting or crafts, but it was a pretty cool day and I thought I’d share the story.

Today we sailed through the Geirangerfjord to see the famous Seven Sisters waterfall. For some reason last night, I thought it was a good idea to get up at 4:30am to watch us sail past it in the morning. But I dutifully got up when the alarm went off (Remko was already on the bridge since 2:30am) and went outside in the cold, pouring rain. It was pretty cool with all the mist on the water and the early morning light, and I have to admit I felt lucky to see this.

Of course that was until about 3pm this afternoon when the sun came out and we WERE going to sail by them again. (I had thought it was a one-time thing.) Here’s what they look like in the sun.

And this time more people were out on deck to catch the view. It’s crazy how tall these falls are. Here’s a photo of everyone taking photos from the 11th deck onboard and we’re only halfway up the falls at that level.

Across the way there’s another waterfall that’s called the bachelor and it’s said he pines after the sisters and gets help from a bottle of whiskey that you can see in the shape of the falls. I didn’t see it, if you do can you post a comment and tell me where?

One of the passengers caused a fury of photos when he discovered another bachelor near those falls. I think it looks more like a man, what do you think? Can you see him in the rocks?

Oooh, the floors!!

There’s no question that the Russian royal palaces around St. Petersburg are some of the most opulent, over-the-top buildings in the world. Catherine’s Palace in Pushkin has a room with amber panels covering the walls almost from floor to ceiling.

The Hermitage, part of the Winter Palace, is the second largest art museum in the world and is itself a work of art.

Peterhof has the most fountains in the world, the ones in the backyard are covered in gold.

I recently visited these places, and as overwhelming as the chandeliers, silk wallpaper, and even amber walls were, I couldn’t stop staring at the floors. The wood inlay is unbelievable and incredibly intricate. Check out two floors in the Hermitage.


Catherine’s no slouch.

And Peter won’t be outdone, either.

Now my next question is, how do I get the Hermitage floors as appliqué?

Flåm, Norway

Our ship was docked in this tiny, tiny town in the middle of the fjords of Norway from 7am to 1pm and with around 1200 guests and, of course, a passenger-first policy, the chances of crew shore leave were pretty dicey. Around 11 I got my chance to jump ashore for an hour and used it to great advantage, hiking away from the souvenir shops to the waterfalls and flowering countryside. So many textures jumped out, from moss on wet cliffs and trees to clovers peaking out from a pile of rocks on the side of the road. Everything was bright, shiny, and green from the almost constant mist and light rain. I have to share some photos.

Medieval Market

Yesterday in Tallinn, Estonia, they were celebrating summer with a small town festival like our Scandinavian Days. Their theme was Medieval times and the town square was full of people dressed in costume, music, and crafts. Sigh. The sun was out for the second time in 12 days and it was heavenly walking around under its rays looking at the cool things people had made.

There were wool felted hats of all shapes and colors.

Bolts, actual bolts!, of linen for sale. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen a bolt of fabric, but no, they don’t measure in yards here. The conversion rate was about 11 Estonian Krones (abbreviated EEK, as in ahhh!) to the dollar, but I don’t know how many inches or meters you’d get for that.

I even found a stall of Log Cabin quilts. I asked if the block was a traditional pattern for this area and I got a yes, but I think it was a “I’m not sure what you’re talking about, but I think you want me to say yes” yes. :) It was really cool to see though.

However, my heart skipped a beat when I came to a stall selling raw materials. Brightly colored wool yarn and roving. Sigh. I stood for about as long as my friend in another stall trying on four different color shawls, deciding that each was her favorite. I did the same, racking my brain for anything I could make with the entire basket of colors, justifications for leaving the rest of my clothes on the ship so I could pack it all, and even fighting the fact that, although at one time I did learn, I don’t know how to knit. I succeeded in only buying two skeins of yarn and two bundles of roving. It’s just too pretty and a really good thing we’re not coming back. I also found a cute wool angle ornament that I included in the photo below.

Shopping in Copenhagen

It was raining pretty hard in Copenhagen when I was recently passing through, all the more reason to check out Danish stores, right?

We walked into a type of dollar store, this one had everything for either 10 or 20 kroner, which is 2 or 4 Euros. Check out the cool cups, plates, and Thermos-like bottles!

Gaudi’s mosaics

Gaudi left behind some amazing mosaic work all over Barcelona, Spain, especially in Park Güell. Here stands the world’s largest park bench completely covered in broken tile.


Every color is represented and multiple patterns are thrown in, but the bench is divided into sections with similar background colors. Maybe we could pick up a few pointers about color usage in quilts from this work.

Underneath the bench is a room filled with columns where the ceiling is covered in mosaics as well.


What a great place to spend a couple hours!

Lost in Venice

Venice is known in images.

Gondolas and canals.

Pigeons in front of St. Marks.

Glass and masks and art supplement the standard tourist souvenirs of postcards and knick-knacks making window shopping extra special. Drooling over the displays in Gucci and Fendi doesn’t hurt, either. As I strolled the streets surrounding St. Mark’s, I decided I’d walk back to the ship, rather than take a vaporetto (city bus). I’d get a chance to see the streets and the small canals, and sure, even though I didn’t have a map, Venice isn’t that big.... Okay yes, I did get lost and yes it was more than once, but I managed to stumble upon a small museum with an eye-catching display of its own.

The slogan for the show was “When time turns into art.” I was late, so I didn’t investigate whether the art took a long time to make and thus made it beautiful, or if the show was vintage items. But the work outside looked like it was made of metal strung together with wire. It could have been both vintage and time-consuming, but it looked like a quilt and was definitely worth getting lost to find.

Patchwork Floor

Coasting along the narrow lanes of what we assume is Athens, Greece because we can’t read the signs, the taxi begins to vibrate with the large drops of rain hurling from the sky. Zeus? It stops as the driver tells us to get out now, that he won’t go further up the hill. We walk up the even narrower passage between apartment buildings, almost able to touch both walls if we reach out our arms. We follow the crowds to the entrance of the Acropolis.


Without a guide or any previous research, I take photos of piles of rubble once part of the great Parthenon--I think.

What mesmerizes me the most? Not the legends nor the enormity of the structures in front of me. It’s the fabulous stone walkway beneath my feet. The recent rain has washed away the chalky dust, revealing deep gray, tans, and even brick red. Beautiful.

I could make a quilt like this. Pieces placed where they fit, no design, just color.

Rhodes, Greece

With the sun shining brightly and the temperature regularly a balmy 80, the last place I expected to find intricately beaded and embroidered quilts was Greece, but when I was in Rhodes today I came across several stalls of them.


Mainly I found rugs and embroidered or crocheted tableclothes, but there were some quilted gems that I had to run across the crowded street to ogle. This reverse appliqué quilt with blanket stitching and star embroidery was different than the rest and I have to make something in similar colors. I LOVE IT!