I think it's going to my my mother. First: convice her I'm not crazy. Second: throw all the info I've been getting at her and decide whether to make it as two seperate peices or use the chupa pattern. Third: enlist grandmother to help with the harder bits.

And those books are a great idea - I'm sure I can find one or both of them at the library, and it will be awesome to have a resource like that, so I'm not going in blind.