Remember these crazy things?

They're the funny front panels from the original pattern for my pop sweater. They came out so well that I couldn't rip them out, even though they didn't work all sewn together in the actual sweater. So I saved them and they laid around collecting dust until last week when I needed some swatches to use in the finishing class that I was teaching. Much better than regular old square swatches, they were like mini-sweater swatches, with sloped shoulders to seam together, side seams, and that great curved neckline for picking up stitches.

They look way better like this than they ever did in the sweater!