one dot means easy, right?



Burda 12/03 pattern #131 in a bold, cotton flower print

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Hey ma, happy mother's day - your shrug is all done! Now you have to come visit us to get it.

And here's a picture of the back. Neat pattern, huh? Just a long rectangle sewn cleverly together to make this cool shape. I really like it. If I didn't already have a poncho of my own....

While I resign myself to having no nyc shrug of my own, I can enjoy my new big, slouchy, beachy Burda top.

I love it! The big sleeves are so fun to wear. I just want to hug myself the whole time I've got it on. The fabric was a gift from my mom and the pattern book a gift from my mother-in-law, so thanks moms!

I found the perfect little daisy buttons to match the daisy cardigan and sewed them in last night. I'm getting the finishing done on this one a little at a time. A few minutes of seaming here, a few minutes of weaving in ends there. I still have that collar to do, but then she'll be all done and she can be on her way. Sniff, sniff. I'll miss this little cardigan. She was a real pleasure to knit.

And I fired up the Bernina again and have begun sewing my big Burda top. Look, I'm sewing my first sleeve!

(Shrug update: all nine balls knit - check back tomorrow for the big mother's day reveal!)

I'm real busy these days getting the house ready for an extended visit by the in-laws. In addition to "clean sweep"ing a lot of the crap out of the guest room/office, I finally got down to reorganizing all my stash and current projects. Wow, I've got a lot of things on the needles right now! And I also found three unfinished sewing projects to add to my two new ones. My side of our bedroom is suffering from some serious craft creep!

Last night's feeble attempt to stem the tide consisted of cutting out the fabric for my big Burda top. Here's the pattern pic (from the 12/03 issue). The pattern is written for fleece, but I wanted something springy, so I'm using this flowery cotton print my mother gave me gobs of, since the pattern requires lots of yardage. If the cotton doesn't work out, I might try it again with some polyester knit fabric I have. And if it does work out, I'll definitely be trying it again with my knit fabric! Here's a peek at the flowery fabric. It's the wrong side, so imagine it all brighter and bolder, if possible!

I hope to be able to sew up this top relatively quickly, so I can reacquaint myself with the machine and gain enough confidence to start the Butterick top. Hey, sew-alongers - any progress on the Butterick top so far? Did you check out the pattern reviews?

My NYC shrug at Knitsmiths yesterday. I'm working hard on making my mother's day deadline. Three of nine balls knit = a third of the way there. That means six more balls worth of black stockinette stitch. Sigh.

In slightly more exciting news, I solved the Burda maze and was able to trace and cut out my pattern pieces for my simple, slouchy top.

Just wait till you see the fabric! The boys will love it: biiiiiiiig, yebie flowsies.

Yes, you knew it had to happen, a sew-along for that little Butterick pattern that everyone seems to have.

I know that some of you will be done in no time, so we'll make this a brief one. How about the month of May? That gives me a goal to shoot for too.

To get warmed up, I'm trying out what looks like a pretty simple Burda pattern for a cozy, blousy top. Well, the pattern instructions look simple once I find the pattern pieces in this maze of lines.

Yikes!