Happy New Year, everyone!!

My new year's goal was to finish up all my recent projects so that I can now get back to the older projects I've still got on the needles. And the results...

Newly completed:

• my blue hat: Finished the quick little hat for myself in a jiffy and I love it. Lookie! The yarn is so soft and it feels so warm and snuggly on. I've named this project 'my blue hat' in honor of Becky (my blue house), who managed to find me what were practically the last skeins in all of France of this now discontinued color! Yea for Becky!
  
• mutssjaals: I finished weaving in the ends over the last few days. Obligatory cute pictures:

 

Old, but not forgotten:

• native, now in progress since Spring 2002. My mother is getting anxious to wear this and I'm excited to see what leftovers I might have of the Rowan Handknit DK Cotton.
  
• elizabeth III, in progress since Fall 2001. I have reknit the front and back (again!) and still need to rip out the sleeves, reknit them, sew it all up again, and pray!
  
• dale bug sweaters, in progress since Fall 2002. I was doing well on the first of these when Christmas knitting interrupted me. I'm looking forward to getting back to these and to try out the steeking with my new sewing machine.

Wishing you all a wonderful new year filled with many successful projects!

New stuff that will most likely interfere with my plans to finish last year's UFO's:

• hotties: Dava, our Knitsmiths' founder made this hot water bottle cover from Rowan #28 and it was so amazingly beautiful that I decided I had to make it. I'll be knitting two (as always), but this time for my two great Aunts.
  
• greensleeves: I've been thinking about and planning this since I got the yarn at the Knitsmiths' yarn swap in November. Dava brought her new swift and ball winder to knitting group on Sunday and I wound all the skeins into balls. Now I'm really itching to start this project.
  
• brown butter: This vest for my husband, in Rowan's smooth as buttah wool/cotton, should be completed by his birthday (May), if I can just settle on a pattern!
  
• the blue sweater: Although this is the blue blog, I have yet to knit myself a blue sweater. I've seen a few fellow knitbloggers (Becky, Kim, and Clemence) work on sweaters in Giboulees, a fabulous bumpy yarn from Phildar, so I bought myself some for Christmas, in blue. I'm obsessing now about what exactly I want to do with it.

We had a lovely white Christmas here in Boston and the boys had their first non-freaked out experience in the snow. They wore their little animal hats that I made for them at Halloween (since their mutssjaals weren't finished yet then). Wanna see?  S the Bear & B the Tiger

As you can tell, I'm enjoying the freedom I still have of dressing my boys in whatever I like for the day. They wear their handknits pretty much as often as I'm willing to wash them! So here's hoping that I'll have at least one more year before they decide they don't want to wear any of the silly things that mom wants to make and I am relegated to knitting boring brown sweaters for them. I do really like the stylish boy sweaters in books like Rowan Junior a lot, but they're just not as fun for mommy to look at as, say, a Dale sheep sweater. Know what I mean?

The other day, I mentioned some new projects on the horizon that have the greatest probability of interfering with my completing the UFO's of last year. Kathy asked about the hot water bottle cover and whether a wool cover wouldn't insulate the bottle too much. I wrote back that, when knit up, the Kid Classic yarn called for in the pattern is quite light and airy, blah, blah, blah.

Oops, busted! It's already on the needles. Yup, instead of starting the year off right, I ran out, bought the yarn and started on the hotties. I had planned just to scope out the yarn at the store and actually wanted to find a substitute yarn that was machine washable. But when I picked up other yarns knit at the same gauge, they did seem too dense for this project and the colors were nowhere near as pretty. Plus the Kid Classic has mohair in it, which makes the rather sterile hot water bottle seem so feminine and lovely. Anyway, I saw some colors I really liked, picked them up and simply couldn't stop myself after arriving home from "swatching a bit".  Here's what I've done so far.

And have you all read about how totally hip these water bottle covers are nowadays? Check out the NYTimes Style article from last weekend. Over $100 for a cover, water bottle not included!

Kim has started her first Dale sweater and (unintentionally) shamed me into getting back to work on my Dale bug sweaters. Thanks, Kim!

I was surprised at how well I was able to pick up the two-handed fair-isle knitting again. It actually felt pretty natural. I managed to finish the heads on the little row of dudes at the bottom of the sweater body and have finally begun the bugs (volkswagen, that is). Check it out! Although it's going pretty well, I do find myself knitting and knitting, desperately trying to get to the few one-color rows between the motifs. Just 10 more rows to straight knitting... just 7 more rows to straight knitting... just 2 more rows to straight knitting... aahhh....

And in other anxiety-ridden news, the knitted Christmas gifties I worked so hard to finish in time to send to Germany have apparently gotten lost in the mail. No sign of them yet, when they should have been there the week before Christmas. Aaarrggghhhhh!

So, you remember my description of the real blue room, right? (Check out the sidebar here if not.) Quick summary: childhood home in the 1970's, tacky colored carpet everywhere, blue (and I mean blue) guest room. Well, I just happened to find this old picture of me at about four or five years old sitting in the blue room. The carpet's not in the picture, but I suspect that the wallpaper is enough to give you the idea. Of course the chair is also blue. No wonder we just called it the blue room!

And you know what I'm sitting next to? My mom tells me that was the sewing machine! It's a drop-in cabinet thingie. I vaguely remember us having a sewing machine, but I don't remember my mother sewing often and I had no idea that the machine used to be in that room. How neat that out of some strange childhood fondness for it, I just happened to pick the blue room to "house" my knitting web pages (I was even planning on adding a page or two when I start sewing) and that was where the sewing machine was in our house. Cool.

My mother also tells me that my grandmother knit. This is news to me. She had rheumatoid arthritis and had stopped knitting before my time. My mother says she still has the last sweater that she made somewhere. It's nice to know that I'm carrying on this hobby of hers, even though she couldn't teach me. And one of my great aunts (she'll be getting one of the hotties) is a wonderful sewer. I hope that when I start sewing, I can do her proud. So there's actually quite a bit of tradition behind my taking up knitting and sewing. Not bad for someone who learned to knit at thirty from friends and books and is just taking up sewing. Must be in the genes somewhere.

My in-laws are coming from Germany to visit for couple of weeks and so I got to thinking about that side of the family tree as well. My husband's grandparents had a beautiful old sewing machine that they brought to Germany from Hungary after the war and they apparently also kept the whole family well supplied with knitted socks. And his grandmother on the other side was a professional seamstress. I'm looking forward to getting a few sewing tips from my mother-in-law. Maybe she can help me get over my fear of the sewing machine and help me make my first stitches. Daughter/mother-in-law bonding over needlework. A new tradition perhaps.

Hello?

Anyone out there?

I hope you all can see me, 'cause I haven't been able to access my website at all today. I seem to be in the same predicament that Ivete was when she was in Brazil. This sucks! Thankfully, my (wonderful, amazing, super-hero of a) husband managed to rig up a system where I can update, so I'll just continue to post as if nothing were wrong and hope that it's making its way out onto the web.

Luckily, I seem to be able to view every other possible website out there. So for as long as this auto-blackout continues, I will have to console myself by getting to know all of you out there in the knitbloggers ring and beyond. Say hi in the comments (and reassure me that things are hunky-dorey as far as you can see) and I'll be sure to swing on by your site and say hi back. Deal?!

My in-laws have arrived from Germany and they brought with them my copy of the new Rebecca magazine! Woo hoo! (The website doesn't seem to have any pictures up yet. Be patient!) I enjoy the Rebecca magazine a great deal. Remember? Well, this is their Spring/Summer catalog and they've got a few really lovely tops that almost make me want to start knitting in cotton again. Almost! But seeing as we've pretty much had snow and below freezing temperatures every day since before Christmas, I'm thinking about just adapting some of the styles to increase the fabbiness factor of the wool sweaters I already have planned. There are some sexy scoop-neck/off-the-shoulder looks that are really calling to me.

Remember how I was knitting the mutssjaals together with Becky? Well, she's finished hers and it is sooo lovely. Go see! Seeing Becky's makes me I wish I'd had the patience to knit mine in the beautiful Lambswool that the pattern called for, but the bigger gauge of the Cascade 220 allowed me to complete my two in about the same time. And that has allowed me to get back to knitting the Dale sweater, which is a good thing. I'm well into the next row of bugs (photos coming when the server is working again).

And do the words Wild & Wooly Semi-Annual Clearance Sale ring a bell? Well, it's tomorrow, starting at 7am. I am so there!

And remember, say hi in the comments and let me know that my site is alive and well (despite my being unable to see it) and I promise to write back and/or come visit your site.

I got some more yarn. Okay, okay, I know. But...

First, fellow Knitsmith, Dava, gave me a big, beautiful skein of purple yarn to go with the green tweed I got at our yarn swap. They complement each other perfectly! I love it! In exchange I'll be giving her some leftover Lamb's Pride. She's going to make a real cool sweater out of scraps of different colored Lamb's Pride. I think it's gonna be sort of like the magic ball idea that I've heard Kaffe Fassett has used.

Then, a representative of Boston Healthcare for the Homeless stopped by at Knitsmiths on Sunday and offered us some wool yarn that had been donated to the shelter in exchange for acrylic yarn. Many of the women who come there crochet and the shelter offers them yarn to make themselves afghans and warm stuff. They can't really use genuine wool, since they need something which requires very little care. So I went to Michael's and picked up some nice looking Red Heart and Lion Brand to exchange for 10 balls of this Irish tweedy wool.

And as you know, I went to Wild & Wooly to check out their winter clearance sale. They had some wonderful yarn there, but I was good. I was sooooo tempted though. They had some beautiful Cash Iroha from Noro (25% off!!), but I rather reasonably explained to myself that a cashmere/silk blend is perhaps not ideal for a mother of two toddlers. Then there was the Sisik from Dale that I kept coming back to, but my conscience told me that I already have two projects worth of tweedy wool wedged under the bed as it is, so I resisted. There was also a little bag of Pinguoin yarn in assorted pale pinks and reds, just enough for to make a beautiful sweater for a little girl, which I don't have, so there was no justifying that. And when I found some boy colors I recalled that this year is already booked as far as sweaters for the boys is concerned. But as KnitDad so succinctly wrote in the comments yesterday, "like, what's the point" if you're not going to buy anything? Right on, Larry! So I bought this luscious all season's cotton to make this little number from the new Rebecca.

That's not too bad, right? It seems that I was just good enough that the server gods have forgiven me for whatever offence it was that caused them to shut me down for a day and I'm fully-operational here again. Whoopee!

We've reached maximum visitor capacity here at home, so I'm not getting any knitting done. I'll even be missing the Knitsmiths this afternoon, which I almost never do. I hope to get back into some evening knitting next week and then I should have more to report on. Until then, I'll leave you with a little photo of the boys from last March, wearing jackets and booties knitted by some of my husband's relatives.

Well, I finally managed to get some knitting done and made progress on the hotties. What's really neat about the hottie pattern, besides the fact that it is oh so mega-hip, is that it's a great introduction to sweater knitting for beginners. You have to do all the same sort of shaping and seaming, add a collar, and you have to make sure that it will fit (although I expect that the hot water bottle is a fairly forgiving recipient). As it is essentially just a tiny sweater, I am in full finishing avoidance mode. I abandoned the blocked pieces of hottie #1, waiting to muster up the energy to sew them together, and knitted hottie #2 to the same point (bad picture, it's really purple!). It's still yet to be blocked. Oh, and I haven't picked out buttons yet. Okay, I also haven't gotten any hot watter bottles.

Hey, don't worry about finishing those sweaters out there folks, instead go check out the new Rebecca magazine. It's hot!

Since my in-laws are visiting, I haven't been able to knit very much at all and I am really missing it. Except for knitting up the main parts of the second hottie, I haven't touched the needles. I must be going through withdrawl or something, because I've been wicked cranky and uptight. Time for some knitting therapy!

So, tonight I decided to work on the hotties some more and if possible finish one of them. I got myself all psyched up by going out and buying the actual hot water bottles and then I found the perfect buttons. There's no stopping me now, I thought. Well, I picked up the first hottie to add the neck and after knitting the little turtleneck to the point where it's supposed to roll over, I realized that I'd begun with the wrong side, so the purl side would end up showing. [Insert favorite swear here]! I've ripped it out and am now feeling utterly frustrated, having wasted what promises to be my only knitting time for the week. Now I don't even feel like picking up the needles. [Repeat swear here]!

I feel better now. The boys were very nice to me today, taking such a long nap that after forcing myself to get over my frustration, I was able to finish the neck on hottie #1. I've still got the final seaming and weaving in of ends to do, but then it's done! I also had time to block hottie #2. Making some progress on these has really revitalized me. Maybe I can make it these next three days until life gets back to normal here.

I picked up my Dale bug sweater and realized that I hadn't posted a picture of the progress I'd made before my in-laws arrived. Well let me do that right now:

I'm pretty excited about having gotten so far. The bugs are kinda lumpy, but I just keep telling myself that pressing it will make everything look perfect (or at least good enough for my first fair-isle).

I'm just one row of vw's away from starting the neck steek. I don't want to cast off stitches in the middle for the neck and then have to do the two-handed, two-color thing back and forth, so I've decided to do some sort of steek here. But I'm not 100% sure what sort of steek I should make (it's supposed to be a v-neck, by the way). I was thinking I'd just cast off the center stitch and then cast on new stitches above to make a little kangaroo pouch thing, like Elizabeth Zimmerman and Alice Starmore suggest, and like Wendy did with Luskentyre and Rosendal. But I've also seen people just knit a shapeless tube, use the machine sewing line to "create" the neck shape and then cut out the extra knitted fabric (described here). I think this is the way the Philosopher's Wool people do it. And the woman who taught the steek class I took had done this Dale sweater that way.

What to do? All the decisions in this steeking deal seem so frighteningly final!

Hotties are all done. I love the colors! They remind me of berries. They shoud be on their way to my great aunts next week. I hear that it's actually been pretty cold in Texas where they live, so maybe they can use them to stay a little warmer. You know, Texas heating can be a little like New England air conditioning: eleven months out of the year it's the most useless thing in the house, and in that twelfth month, it's just weak. Very berry hotties to the rescue!

I got some encouragement and tips from the helpful folks at my LYS to do the neck steek kangaroo-style. So here's the body with the steek begun! And a close-up of the steek. I didn't mark where the steek stitches began so I accidentally shifted them after a few rows, but I'm not going back. And I think I should have done the edge stitches right before and after the steek stitches in the background color instead of doing the pattern there, but I'm not going back. I think that once I pick up stitches and do the neckband, it will look fine. That is, after I CUT it!!

It's so freaky looking that I just can't wait to cut it open to see how the neck comes out. It's a brilliant solution. Apparently I can sew and cut right down the middle of the steek stitches and don't have to worry about any of my machine sewing lines showing or messing up the nice neck shaping. And there's no way I could leave it like this, so no chickening out of the cutting part! Of course, I also have to cut the sleeve openings on the sides and that does seem more like I messing up a finished garment. Better read over Flor's tips again before doing that!

As for the knitting, I think I have finally totally gotten the hang of the two-color knitting. The little dudes and the first four rows of bugs are kinda lumpy, but this last row of bugs is coming out perfectly flat. For unknown reasons, the tension with my left hand has suddenly made a dramatic improvement. (Blush. Curtsey.)

Stuck at the steek again. Back neck steek this time. The VW sweater instructions say to cast off 35 stitches to begin the back of the neck. I placed them on separate yarn instead of casting off and then was about to cast on 5 steek stitches as I did for the front when I realized that my circular needle was just too long for my new number of stitches. I needed shorter size one circs and the yarn store is closed Mondays and it was a holiday anyway, so no chance.

Never fear, a new project is here!! Becky hooked me up with this fabulous Phildar baby catalog a while ago and it turns out we both wanted to make the same jacket pattern. I was saving these until next fall, but Becky wants to start hers now, so I just had to jump on the virtual bandwagon with her and do another knit-along. Fun, fun!

Since I couldn't continue with my Dale sweater, I swatched a bit with the Phildar yarn, a wonderfully soft alpaca tweed called Legende, got lucky with the gauge and started the back. Sorry to jump ahead, Becky, but what's a girl with the wrong sized needles to do? Today it's off to the yarn store and then back to the bugs!

Check out fluffa! as our knit-along gets underway. And in other virtual knit-along news, be sure to watch Emma and her friend Sissel's knit- and felt-along.

Yesterday I mentioned that I had to put the bugs on hold because my circular needle was too long to keep knitting in the round after taking off the neck stitches (and adding a small neck steek). Shortly after buying a new needle today, I stumbled upon Marilyn's, aka the Knitting Curmudgeon's, latest blog entry describing a technique that could solve the problem, by pulling a so-called magic loop of circ cable out of the round of knitting and just pretending that the needle is shorter. Marilyn does a good job summing up the pros and cons of the technique, so check out her thoughts.

Then later today, Michelle, aka another knitting blogger, mentioned the same technique in my comments and posted some pictures of it in progress on her blog. How helpful (and handy, as Marilyn would say!).

The idea looks pretty cool. I'm almost disappointed that I was able to get the needle that I needed! I think I will try it out when I start the sleeves of the second Dale sweater, since I found it difficult to deal with the two-color knitting and the basic double-pointed five-needle fumbling all at the same time. I'd love to be able to avoid that in the future. I had thought about those teeny little Clover needles, but can you really use those with adult sized fingers??

Anyway, thanks to you bloggers out there for being so gosh-durned knowledgeable and sharing your experiences. And since this is my blog and it's all about sharing my experiences, here now (brought to you by new size one, 16" Crystal Palace bamboo circs) my funny kangaroo pouch developing over the back neck steek.

I did it! I cut my first steeks. After finishing up the knitting on the body of the Dale sweater, I was really excited about cutting the steeks open and seeing how the neck would turn out. I also have one sewing class under my belt, which means that I knew how to thread my machine and run a line of stitches. I figure that and a bit of chutzpa is all you really need, right? OK, that, chutzpa and Geane's Knit a Norgi page by your side. So I pulled out the Bernina for its inaugural run.

Wanna see?

As you can see from the pictures, I first went to work on my old swatch from the steek workshop I took in November. I put the first sewing lines to the test with a lot of picking and pulling and decided to try making the machine stitches a bit smaller. The second steek withstood my abuse much better. So, off I went. Back neck steek on the block. Two, uh make that three, lines of machine stitching on either side and then snip down the middle. Not too bad, really. The front neck steek was a little scarier. It was quite a bit longer and came down to one single stitch for the center of the v-neck. I was worried about missing the opening and sewing (or worse, cutting!) into that stitch and below. But nerves of steel and a constant refrain of 'I can knit this again' got us both through unscathed.

Now, I need to recouperate before I can even begin to think about doing the armholes. We'll see how the steeks hold up to lying around in the project bag for a few days. If they survive that, I'll consider it.

Slipped the bug sweater on one of the boys yesterday to see if it will be big enough. It was a little weird looking on, since there aren't any armholes yet, but there's plenty of room in it. When I took it off him, he seemed disappointed. In fact, both of them were almost admiring the sweater and looked to be eyeing it for themselves. Maybe they're starting to get used to me measuring them and slipping half-knitted garments on them. Whatever the reason, this sweater they like!

The knit-along continues. Becky has begun her tweed jacket and mine is also progressing. Here is the back completed. I can't seem to get the color to come out right in the pictures, but my yarn is unfortunately not as bright as the blue in the catalog photo or the photo on Becky's site. Different dye lot, maybe? It's still lovely though and the accent colors are really cool, so stay tuned for them! This yarn is really great to work with. It is so soft to the touch and is just sliding along my needles (in a good way, that is). Clemence, of ...au fil des augilles... is also making a sweater with this yarn and singing its praises as well. And I hear that Kerrie is using too, but no reports of it yet on her blog!

On the sewing front, I'm hoping to do a sew-along with Rebecca. Yesterday she mentioned wanting to make one of those knitting needle holders that everyone seems to be making and I thought what a great idea! I've seen so many of you make such cool cases and thought that would be an excellent first project. Remember Ivete's needle holder, which she made after getting a sewing machine for her birthday? Check out the incredible one Inga just made with fabric by Kaffe Fassett. Inga's was inspired by this lovely case that Tracy made for Wendy for her birthday. I found a link at homemade slice of chaos which brought me to this little pattern at Miasma. And she was inspired by fellow knitblogger, The Knitting Queen, and so on, and so on...

I haven't done too much knitting since my last post, mostly just thinking about what to tackle next. After finishing the back of the first of the giranimal tweed jackets, I thought about starting the front. Logical, right? But then I took a look at the pattern for the front pieces. If you look at the picture, you see that front is asymmetrical, with two different sized front panels each with raglan shaping and a sweet little curve near the neck. In addition to the giraffe motif, the unique style is what really made me want to make the jackets. But, the directions are a little complicated with lots of 'while doing these decreases, also on left side do this and at x cm start doing this other thing...'. Yikes! I've been a little too sleep deprived to be working my way through that right now. So, I thought I would just start on a sleeve instead (the colors are pretty accurate this time!). Besides, I really wanted to get to that chartreuse accent color. It looked so scrumptuous in the bag!

I'm thinking about trying the armhole steeks on the bug sweater this afternoon, that is, if the boys can take a nice long nap for me. And I've also been thinking about this yarn that I got from the Boston Healthcare for the Homeless in trade for lots of acrylics. I'm daydreaming about another Phildar sweater, this one a nice big slouchy cardigan.

I cut the first armhole steek yesterday. I didn't have time during the boys' naptime to get started on the second one. But perhaps that's best. I'm much more nervous about these armhole steeks than I was about the neck steeks. Now I have the opportunity to put this steek to the 'project bag' test like I did those. Then again, perhaps I should try to do the steeks as quickly as possible so that I can sew in the sleeves and cover them up as soon as I can. What steeks? Cutting? Where? I don't know anything about that. Oh, ignorance is bliss.

For all out there following the tweed baby jacket/Phildar Legende knit-along, I've made some progress on mine. I finished the first sleeve and then thought that the second one looked so funky in the schematic that I just had to knit it right up as well. As I mentioned before, the front is both wierdly assymetrical and has raglan armhole shaping. That means that at some point the sleeve takes over button band duty. So that's that strange little piece hanging off the second sleeve. I think Becky went ahead and took on the challenge of doing the front. I'll have to see how she managed before I give it a try! Kerrie has posted on her progress with her Legende baby jumper and Clemence is now working on a sleeve for her own Legende pullover.

My sew-along is also progressing. Rebecca has started her needle case, but seems to be having trouble posting pics on her blog. (Frowny face.) She was generous enough to write up some beginner-friendly directions for me (thankful, smiley face) and following those, I managed to sew a hem on the inside pocket piece and then one seam joining the various pieces. I think it looks pretty good so far (and here is a close up of my crazy fabric!). But I've stopped at this point because I can tell now that the pocket will be too deep for my short double-points (yes, I generally prefer the little, short, plastic ones, but I do have normal dpns too). So, I am anxiously awaiting further instructions. Sewing class is on Thursday. We're only up to cutting out pattern pieces, but maybe I can ask for advice after class.

Didn't get too much done yesterday on my two craft-alongs. I started the cute giraffe pocket for the giranimal jacket, but man, it's going slow! The pocket is knitted with a single strand on 3mm needles (whereas the rest of the jacket is knitted doubled on 5mm) and it's intarsia, so I've got tiny needles and big skeins to move around over and over. Ugh! I've only done about an inch and that's all curled up since it's stockinette, so no update picture today.

I did almost finish sewing my needle case (I love the fabric - very Hundertwasser , don't ya think?). I know the case really doesn't look much different from the last picture, but now the seams are all done. Unfortunately, they're all a bit wonky. I'm pretty sure that I don't have any idea about how to properly select the tension and stitch length, etc., so that may be the problem. I'm happy with it though for a first project. It will definitely work (now that I ripped out the first seam and shortened the pocket, my little dpns fit inside) and it rolls up real nicely. I still have to make a little tie to hold it closed. Many, many thanks to Rebecca for her help! I think it has been a great introduction to sewing. (Did you know that there was so much ironing in sewing?? Who knew?) I've got extra fabric, so I think I'll try to make another little case for my sewing notions.

Yesterday, I got to meet up with some other Boston area knitbloggers - Kim and Amy - to do a little knitting (what else?). Kim had the idea a couple of weeks ago and when we settled on the day, I hadn't realized that it was my wedding anniversary. Ooops! But hubby let me go out to meet my new knitbuds and we saved the cake for when I got back. To make it up to him, I started working on his brown butter vest, but I barely managed to get half an inch knitted. Chalk it up to too much fun chatting and too little accurate counting. And the fact that a man's vest is like gigantic! I think my sense of scale has been all thrown off working on the baby stuff so much. Size warp! Maybe I'll try to work on this vest once I get all my current baby stuff to the finishing stage, so I can readjust.

Blue is for knitting. And maybe a little sewing too? Here's part of my first big project pinned out and ready for cutting. I love the look of sewing patterns pinned to fabric, don't you? But it's awful hard to believe that it's going to end up being a dress. Pinning took just shy of forever. I don't suppose we'll get to any actual sewing in my natural lifetime. Despite my whining, I am really enjoying it. It's a lot more precise than knitting, but less worrisome - it's fairly reassuring to already have pieces that look like what they are supposed to be! It does seem as if it's one big finishing job, though: getting the pieces into the right shape, assembling, seaming. But somehow I like it more than finishing a sweater. Maybe it's just because I'm looking forward to using the machine again! I really enjoyed the feel of sewing while making the needle case. Uh oh, I think I'm hooked.

Oh, and in case you read the little article in the new Interweave Knits about knitblogs and were wondering: no, I'm not Ivete. What up wit' dat?!