Cardi for me

After making Mum's cardi and top, I decided I had better get my act together and make mine.

I had some brown Mercury Jersey from Lincraft that was waiting for its turn, so the other week, after reading a couple of reviews on PR (got to love that place if you want to save yourself some frustration) I started on this project.

I didn't do any adjustments to the Cardi pattern and only did some of my normal adjustments to the top e.g.:

High Round back and Sway Back.



Then I did the front neck gaposis and also continued this through the front neck facing.

• I read yorkshire lass's review and she did her “layout of the fronts single layer as directed but chalked the position of the first one onto the fabric then fit the other one around the chalked line. This way I got the two fronts way closer together than the layout suggests is possible”. This worked well for me as well and it made it a lot easier to cut out the front pieces as well.

• I read some of the others reviews and decided to follow their leads and not sew the elastic in the back neck area. Instead, I gathered this area down to 5”. Then I sewed the back collar facing to the neck seam so the facing would stay down on the inside. This created a very stable collar so I don't need to fuss when I put it on and it stays in place.

• I deepened the armholes for both the Cardi and Top by 2cm (7/8") and the sleeves fitted in nicely.

• I made View D of the Cardi Wrap so I can't do any of the wraps. I am wondering if I should shorten the cardi as I shortened the top by 5cm (2").

So here is the top with my skirt from the Mini Wardrobe



and now with the cardi



Another one of the challenges for the 2010 SWAP at Stitcher's Guild was that a garment will feature embroidery, beads or sashiko.

This is not something I have tried before and looking at the RTW it is everywhere.

Now Alison, one of my sewing buddies has the Professional Touch Applicator Wand and has just used it to add the bling to her daugters dress and shoes.

Well Alison has kindly offered to let me test drive before I purcahse this Wand and to help me along further Alison also kindly purchased for me at the Craft Expo in March two packs of Nail Heads. Here is what I came up with yesterday playing with the nailheads and I think I will do this when I catch up with Alison again and when I figure out how to mark the pattern on the neckband so it looks correctly spaced.



Oh I forgot to tell you that I have had some labels made to put into my garments. It is supposed to encourage me to finish my garments in a more professional way, unfortunately I can't find a brown sharpie to hide the fact that I used cream overlocking thread LOL.