Testers are such an important part of the indie pattern design process. They help ensure that a pattern fits just right on a wide range of bodies and makes sense to the average sewist across the world. Good testers help me to polish off any last bits of roughness from a pattern, asking all the questions I might have missed answering. The testers for the Mahina Cardigan were just wonderful. You can tell how amazing they are by how many of them made multiple cardigans, just because they enjoyed sewing them and wearing them so much! Here are the tester makes! Gillian of Crafting a Rainbow@craftingarainbow Gillian made the Mahina View C out of a delicious purple knit that looks incredibly soft even in the photos. It shows off the drape of the cardigan beautifully! Read her blog post for a full review of the pattern. Kerstin of Hertzwerk-Freiburg Kerstin’s Mahina is a wonderful example of what the cardigan looks like in a very light, sheer knit. And she sent me photos with 13 different …

It’s been a long time since I’ve done a life catch-up post. So long, that some of the things I’ve been collecting for it feel like they happened years ago… I’m pretty sure it’s only been months, but life is moving very fast for me! So what have I been up to? 1. Lots of visits to Zealandia My lovely in-laws gave us annual passes to Zealandia for Christmas (best present ever) and I’ve been blissfully indulging my love of/obsession with New Zealand’s native birds at every possible opportunity. Mr D is not quite so obsessed with birds, but he’s delighted to go along with any activity that doesn’t involve costumes, movies with subtitles, or the weekend vege markets, so he’s been loving the weekly (or more) trips to Zealandia. Zealandia has been such a feature of our lives this summer that I’m probably going to gift/inflict you with a post all about it, so I’ll try to restrain myself from posting 1000 pictures in this one. The photo above is a hihi (stitchbird) – …