Basketweave is done

I finished sewing it up yesterday.



This is actually  a man's sweater, at least the original pattern was. I made the smallest size (44") and it fits generously. (I made the sleeves shorter than recommended; any longer and they'd be too long).

I used a brass jeans zipper as the zip in it. Partly because I prefer the chunkier look of the metal against the wool (it's worsted weight, so it's kind of a "crunchy" sweater). Also, sometimes the plastic (nylon) zippers you can buy are kind of wimpy and poop out after a certain amount of wearing, and I don't want to have to replace the zipper any time soon.

I may actually wind up wearing this this week; Monday our high is supposed to be 50 degrees so I might wear this over a blouse and just take it off if I get too warm.

***

Work on the Big Macintosh is progressing. I've finished crocheting the head and am working on the body. I made the chest a bit broader; the original pattern I'm using gave kind of a skinny, slope-shouldered pony, and surely Mac gets too much exercise working on the farm to have a skinny chest.

I've also kind of figured out how to make the legs a bit stockier.

I have yarn put aside for a Colgate, who will be the next pony. And I'm toying with the idea of both really altering the pattern I'm using right now and doing a Bulk Biceps, or using the standard girl-pony pattern I use and making a Maud Pie - though for her, I'd have to get a little bit of dark blue jersey fabric and make up a dress for her; it wouldn't do for Maud to run around starkers. Actually, now, I wonder about the rules-of-dress in Equestria - most of the time the ponies DON'T dress up (there was actually  a sort of funny joke in the Grand Galloping Gala episode about this). Except some ponies do, at least some times. Or maybe the more adult ponies do? (There's precedent for that: in Little Bear, both his parents wear clothing, but Little Bear does not). Both the Cakes wear aprons. And Granny Smith wears at least a shawl.

Or maybe it's just a personal preference thing; maybe Maud covers most of her body in keeping with her normally-rather-impenetrable personality.)


***
And another faith-related thing, if I may:

Interesting observation made in the sermon today, something I had never thought about. The minister pointed out that both Judas and Peter were betrayers, each in their own way. (Judas, literally, and Peter by denying). But their reaction to the regret they felt afterward was very different - Judas tried to return the 30 pieces of silver, could not, and went and hanged himself out of guilt and remorse. Peter, upon hearing the rooster crow and realizing the denials he had made, "wept bitterly" but kept on going....and was ultimately forgiven for what he did, and in fact, became one of the bedrocks of spreading the gospel.

That just struck me. That we all do wrong, but we also have a choice in how we react to that wrong - that we can make the life-denying choice or the life-affirming choice (and seek forgiveness, and keep on going) and that ultimately, if we make the life-affirming choice, everything can change for us.