A week in review

I have been busy with my crafts but have nothing finished to share. I continue working on the baby quilt, below you can see a preview; I am in the middle of machine quilting.



I'm also making progress on Green Gable (I guess mine is White Gable). After working on lace I wanted something simple.



This past Thursday I was a chaperone for my son's ninth grade science class. We went to the Air and Space Museum in DC. They had a handout to complete and after we had some time to wonder around. I found out that Pucci had designed uniforms for the stewardess in the 60's. They had one sample and lots of pictures. Here is one of the pictures they had on display.



I spent Saturday at Hershey Park with my family. We had lots of fun and actually got to ride some roller coasters (my kids are not too keen on them). Their zoo only has native American animals and they have a good selection of specimens, lots of lizards and snakes which are favorites in our household.

I'm kind of tired today but I hope to get some more quilting done after I get everything ready for the school week (laundry, supermarket run, etc).

I got the new Burda WOF yesterday and enjoyed it while having my coffee this morning. There's a lot I like in it, it is after all the dress issue, but I'm also liking the plaid section especially this little vest




And this jacket/top




And lots more....

Shetland Shorty from Knitty.com

I have had this project on my needles for almost a year. The weather got cold and I switched to winter projects so this waited until warmer weather. The lace pattern (4 row repeat) took a while to memorize and I ended up undoing my work quite a few times.

The yarn is Filati FF Sailor (cotton) that I bought from Elann as a full bag and at a very reasonable price. I made a medium which gave me plenty of ease, I wanted it with a loose and relaxed look. I made this to wear with a Burda WOF dress I made a while ago, I'll show a picture when I wear them together.

Lost in DC

Well, not really, more like sitting in traffic in DC, but it wasn't as catchy for a title.

Note to self: Do not attempt to go to the zoo during Easter break.. Really, it took us over an hour to get there (usually at most a 40 min trip) to find the entrance blocked with the sign "no parking available". Now, there is a lot of parking at the zoo, lots, so this was not a good sign, also all around us there were families trying to get to the entrance, nonetheless we tried to find parking on the street with no luck. We ended up on Connecticut Ave again sitting in traffic trying to get downtown to catch New York Ave to get to the National Arboretum, where we decided we could go to enjoy the picnic lunch we had in the cooler. That took about another hour. I have never seen so many people in DC; I guess because we live so close we do our trips during non-peak tourist days. I had a lot of time to study the architecture... Total time from leaving home to the Arboretum 3 1/2 hours...yeaph.

The Arboretum was heavenly, quiet, sunny, cool and few people around. We had our picnic and then walked around some of our favorite gardens.



Camellias in bloom



A view of the river



A Japanese Flower Arrangement Exhibit



The National Capitol Columns



The end of our visit

Burda WOF 10/2008 114 Knit top

I really liked the design for this top/dress when I first saw it and when I saw Christina's version I had to make it.

I tried the top first, that way if it didn't work for me I wouldn't try the dress. This top has been finished for a while and I wore it before today but I wasn't completely happy with it, so today I took it in at the side seam at chest level and a little bit of the "wing" and I'm much happier with the look. When putting it together I reinforced the shoulder area with fusible tape and I raised the neckline (next time I will raise it more ;-) The fabric I used is a very comfortable to wear rayon knit from Joann's, my only complaint is that it wrinkles very easily.

Here are a couple of more pictures.

A Trip to the National Aquarium

At the Australia exhibit

The boys are off for Spring Break and they had been wanting to go to the aquarium, so off we went yesterday.

My whole family loves aquariums and zoos, and we are lucky to have the National Aquarium in Baltimore and the National Zoo in Washington D.C. Tomorrow we are off to the zoo.

Here is a couple of pictures; it was really cold and windy yesterday so we didn't linger outdoors too much.

A bag and a sweater

Today I finally took pictures of the sweater I made for Large Marge's Yarn Shop and of the bag I made for my cousin.

The bag is Sandra Betzina's Vogue 7862. This sews up pretty quickly; I did not add a lining because this pleather fabric has a black knit backing that looks nice.





The pattern for the sweater is Sailor's Rib V-neck Pullover from Vermont Fiber Designs. The pattern is a tunic with no shaping which doesn't work with my pear shape figure so I added shaping to accommodate larger hips and slimming down (by decreasing stitches) up to the waistline. I also added extra rows for my long back waist length. I'll get to wear the sweater after a few months :-)





All pictures were taken at Large Marge's Yarn Shop. If you live in the Baltimore area drop by, they have very friendly staff and a wonderful selection of yarns and patterns.

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My next project is a baby quilt for my future nephew. I have all the fabrics ready to start cutting. I chose Rowan's Baby Block Quilt from Kaffe Fassett's Quilt Road. I'm going to change one of the blocks but pretty much follow their design.

As you can see my colorway is very different but I think it will work. I will probably add a few more fabrics, after all this is supposed to be a scrappy quilt.