Puff-Sleeved Feminine Cardigan

Finally, it is done. Had I finished it a month ago I would probably have had a few opportunities to wear it right away, but now I will probably just pack it away until fall.

Pattern: Puff-Sleeved Feminine Cardigan from Fitted Knits by Stefanie Japel
Size: 36
Yarn: KnitPicks Merino Style in Iris (bought 12 skeins, have 1 or 2 leftover)
Needles: size 4 and size 3
Started: March 13 and finished sometime in early June
This Ravelry link has a couple of different pictures (and you should be able to view it even if you're not a member.)

Modifications: I added a lot to the length, because otherwise this would have been a very cropped sweater. Before the waist-shaping, I knit 35 rows instead of 17, and after the waist-shaping I knit 19 rows instead of 7. Because of the added length I made 11 buttonholes instead of 8. I used a stretchy bind-off for the sleeves.

Buttons: Expensive. I bought the only buttons that Windsor Button had in this color. They were over $2 each because they had a textured pattern on them, which isn't even showing because I wanted the plain side facing out. I looked at non-purple buttons, but really I just wanted something to blend in with the color of the sweater, not stand out or detract from it. I love cardigans, but I could do without having to choose buttons (not to mention sew them on.)

I'm mostly happy with how it turned out, but it is disappointingly boxy. Normally, I choose a size that is a bit small on me and block slightly larger so it is nice and form-fitting, but this time I knit it exactly to my size because the next smallest size would have probably been too small. It fits well, but is just a bit baggy around the waist. Perhaps I should have modified the waist-shaping somehow, but it's so hard to tell how anything will look once it's finished. I even think that maybe I shouldn't have added quite as much length. You can't tell in some of the pictures, but there's one at the Ravelry link above that shows the boxiness, and you can sort of tell in this picture of the back.


I do like the slightly puffed sleeves, and I like how it looks with the neckline open. I meant to take pictures of it buttoned up to the top (which is how it is pictured in the book) but forgot. Oh, and I love the color.

A miracle has occurred!

Somehow, while watching an hour-long webinar on copyright issues, I managed to weave in all 647 ends on my sweater, wash it, and block it. Behold!


I apologize for the crappy photos. It's in one of the darkest rooms of the house and the sun hasn't been cooperating at all recently.

Maybe it’s not technically blocking as I didn’t pin it out. But I think, based on the Yarn Harlot’s recent post and my own sneaking suspicions, that the first time you wash a knitted garment it is by definition being blocked.

Anyhow, I cannot wait to pack this stupid sweater away for the summer. But sometime before I do that, there will be action photos!

Interlude

While waiting for my buttons to magically attach themselves to my cardigan, let’s look at one of my favorite design features of this garment.


These bands were created through a simple pattern of knit rows and purl rows. There’s a set of bands running around the whole cardigan, separating the peplum from the body, as well as at the edges of the sleeves.

If you’ve looked through the patterns in Fitted Knits, you may have noticed that these are a theme. They make lovely borders and edgings, and I have no idea why Stefanie Japel has apparently cornered the market on this very simple but lovely technique. I never see other designers use this, but it’s one of the things I really like about Japel’s designs.

Peplum of vexation

Well. I have completed the lacy peplum on my cardigan, and I’m sorry to report that it is fraught with problems. I shouldn't blame the peplum itself, of course, when fault actually lies with the chart. It is a very simple chart and the errors aren’t until the end, but that may have made it even more frustrating. There I was knitting along, almost at the end, and all of a sudden – stymied!

It is a 20-row chart, and on row 17 I realized that something was horribly wrong. The number of stitches I had on my needles did not match the chart. It was only off by one, but it was the same for every repeat of the lace pattern (6 total) so I was sure the problem was not me making the same error 6 times. I studied the chart and, sure enough, based on the previous rows, the stitch count for row 17 was incorrect. So I just winged it, because it was rather minor and I was SO close to the end.

The next problem was that in rows 17 and 19 each lace repeat begins and ends with a yarn over – that means there are places where there are two YOs in a row, resulting in a big gaping hole. Intentional? Who knows.

As I studied my knitting, a third issue became apparent. The eyelets made from all those YOs are supposed to make nice even diagonal lines and they do not – they are staggered in groups of 2 eyelets on top of each other. It is very difficult to see, but trust me - each of the eyelets you see has another directly below it. If I pull gently on the fabric, they become more visible, and probably will with blocking too.


The picture in the book clearly shows lovely rows of 10 eyelets, all perfectly diagonal as they were intended.


But when I looked on Ravelry, every single finished version of this sweater looked like mine – a veritable stairstep of eyelets stacked in pairs in such a way that when you don’t look closely it looks like a diagonal line of just 5 eyelets. Not one looked like the sweater pictured in the book.


I can live with how it looks, but I'm not at all happy about the fact that the peplum on the original sweater was obviously not knit from the same chart published in the book. This is all especially disappointing because Fitted Knits has been out for a few years and an errata is available – but it contains nothing about this chart. This is also one of the most popular patterns from the book, so it is even more frustrating that corrections haven’t been provided.

Nevertheless, the sweater is coming out well. Luckily the peplum is just a small part of the sweater that will be down by my waist and therefore not very noticeable. (Except by anyone who is reading this post right now and will consequently spot my faulty eyelets immediately.) I’m hoping it is finished soon because I’ve really been wanting to wear it – the weather is perfect for a short-sleeved cardigan right now!

Surprise Knitting, Part 2

Months ago, I bought the pattern for the Coraline cardigan, but had difficult finding affordable yarn. DK weight Alpaca doesn't come cheap. Ultimately I bought KnitPicks Merino Style. I swatched, washed and blocked the swatches, didn't take any notes, and then lost both swatches. Earlier this week I swatched again and determined the yarn and pattern just weren't a good match. Knit loose enough to achieve the drape I wanted, the gauge was too far off. I should have gotten some alpaca.

But I had all this lovely purple yarn wanting to be a cardigan! So I search Ravelry for cardigans made with this yarn (really, what would I do without Ravelry?) and found Stefanie Japel's Puff-Sleeved Feminine Cardigan from her book Fitted Knits. I've already made 3 sweaters from this book but haven't picked it up in a while and had almost forgotten about this sweet little cardigan. It is short-sleeved too, so I may actually finish this during a time of year in which it will be appropriate to wear.

I've made great headway so far, despite spending hours knitting yesterday afternoon only to spend the entire evening undoing what I had done.


I do have some concerns. The gauge swatch changed after washing and blocking, but as we all know, swatches lie. Additionally, a stockinette swatch will stretch more than a sweater than is mostly stockinette but also has raglan increases. I have found through experience that raglan seams don’t stretch especially well.

This is related to my other concern, which is that the shoulder and arm fit will be too tight, as happens with most patterns. I will be doing some measuring and looking at instructions for a larger size – it may be a simple adjustment.

But what of Coraline? I still want to make that sweater as well, but may need to pony up for an actual Alpaca blend yarn. Since I only need so many purple cardigans, I am thinking of gray for Coraline which I believe was my original plan for that sweater.

Meanwhile, it's nice to have a sweater on the needles again! I suspect this sweater will go quickly, so if all goes according to plan I should have frequent updates.