Smaller Sleeve, Top Down

Yesterday, looking ahead, I realised that I have a couple of easy weeks in May without too much activity. That was a mistake. This morning I woke up with a sore ear and that feeling that a cold is imminent. Yuck. It's just like going on holiday and getting sick. So before I take a couple of days off to enjoy ill health (ha, ha) I wanted to show you something.

Many curvy women find that the sleeves of sweaters don't fit. One of the major finds for me when I was writing the Need A Plus Cardigan book was that bust measurement does not necessarily relate to arm measurements. Irregardless, the designer has to still come up with a set of sizes based on bust measurement. Lots of times the sleeves are too big.

If you measure your sweaters, including store-bought double knit jackets you wear, you will probably find that you do wear a large range of sleeve sizes. But you are probably trying to knit your new sweater with an inch to two inches of ease around the sleeve. The schematic is indicating that for your size you are going to get a certain size of sleeve. If you need the sleeve to be smaller, stop increasing on the sleeve about an inch from the bottom of the yoke (one inch less stitches on the sleeve than the pattern says you need at the bottom of the yoke). But what will happen? Won't it distort the raglan line. Yes it will.

I just happen to be knitting a sweater with this feature. I've stopped increasing on the sleeve. Here is a photo of one of the back raglan lines. Can you see where it changes?

Here it is with the black line indicating where the raglan line would have continued and the red line showing the deviation.

Here is a close up.

Doesn't this look remarkably like what your set-in sleeve armhole would look like at this juncture?

I think it's actually an advantage to have the raglan line swing in toward the armpit. I'm working it into the pattern I'm working on now.
Deb

Style first

Our Yarn Over Sleep Over Retreat is this weekend. I kept thinking it was a little further away but here it is already. I'm teaching two classes. One of which is a Make It Fit class.

We are discussing bust, waist and hip shaping. But before we get to that I'm going to discuss a little bit about style. I have to read up on this topic since I'm not sure I have much, style that is. It's all about what to wear for your figure. Here is the jist of it which I found on a Knitting Daily blog which sums up Amy Herzog's style notes:

Amy Herzog, master of knitting fit, has adapted these guidelines for knitters, spelling out four basic rules for understanding and creating visual balance:

1. Add horizontal elements to widen a body part.
2. Add vertical elements to narrow a body part.
3. Use one color or texture to lengthen a body part.
4. Use multiple colors or textures to shorten a body part.

Balancing your visual is all about making your figure appear more hourglass shaped. You can use your sweater to widen parts that need widening and make some parts narrower.

If you are bottom heavy, you want to make your shoulders look wider. Then the idea is that you look balanced. You want to make the top of your yoke draw the eye across. You can make a wide scoop neckline so that your shoulders draw the eye across. You can use cap sleeves which widen the shoulders. You can wear Icelandic style sweaters with lots of patterning across the top of the yoke.

If you are top heavy, the opposite is true. You can put lots of patterning at the bottom edge of your sweater. Lucky you gets to knit nice deep patterned borders.

The vertical and horizontal elements are pretty easy. A cardigan has a vertical when it's left open and also when it's buttoned up with lots of snazzy buttons. Cables and texture work in panels are a wonderful vertical. Horizontal colour changes across the top or bottom are effective.

Do you check the style of a sweater pattern to see if it would look good on your figure? Do you check out the model to see if she is top or bottom heavy. Forget that, most of them are just thin! Do you have sweaters that you get compliments on? Does it have to do with the style of it?

deb

Make your Raglan Sleeve Bigger or Smaller

Top Down Raglan sweaters are infinitely adjustable. An often neglected part of the sweater are the sleeves and sleeves seem to be one of the important parts of a garment that quite a few knitters need to adjust. It's quite simple on a Raglan Top Down to make your sleeves bigger or smaller than the pattern is going to give you for your size.

I learned quite a few new things through working on the Need A Plus Cardigan book and the Need A Circular Yoke book. Here's one important fact: your actual bust measurement (taken with a tape measure) doesn't necessarily indicate the size of your arms. If you have a large bust it does not automatically follow that you have large arms and vice versa. Wow, big news.

This means it's important to check your measurements against the pattern schematic.

Measure your actual bust and your actual upper arm with a tape measure.
Then add the amount of ease to the bust measurement you like (standard bust ease would be 3"/8cm).
Add approximately half that ease to your arm (1 1/2"/4cm). The amount of ease you like totally depends on personal preference of course. Maybe you like tight sleeves or extra loose sleeves. Measure the sleeves of some sweaters that you wear. I bet you'll find a wide range of sleeve width.

Find your closest Finished Size on this schematic and see if the sleeve is going to be the correct finished size for you.
Example:  actual bust measurement 39" + 3" of ease = 42" finished body
actual arm measurement 13" + 2" of ease = 15" finished sleeve  (I like 2" of sleeve ease on a cardigan.)

I would knit the 41" sweater because it's the closest size. But I want a 15" sleeve (my personal preference). The stitch numbers in this pattern will only give me a 14" sleeve. What to do?!

The place to make an adjustment is as you approach the bottom of the yoke. No one will see any adjustment you make here. Begin the pattern from the Top as written and then when you are closer to the bottom of the yoke, begin to think of your sleeves as separate parts of your garment. How would you like them to fit compared to the schematic. Would your ideal sleeve be a little bigger or a little smaller than the sleeve the pattern is going to give you.

Bigger Sleeve: Let's say I want the sleeve to be 1" bigger than this pattern is going to give me. For my gauge, say I need 6 more stitches (even number) on the sleeve. I work the yoke as written until I have 6 LESS stitches on my sleeve than the pattern says I should have at the bottom of the yoke. (This also totally works if you need the sleeve to be bigger by more than 1". Really it does.)

Bottom of Yoke before Divide Row: the pattern says I should have 56 sts on sleeve.
I'm going to stop when I have 50 sts (56 - 6 = 50 sts)

Now I'm going to work an extra increase right beside the regular Raglan increase, on both sides of my sleeve and work the regular Raglan increases on the Fronts and Back as written, to the bottom of the yoke.
On my sleeve: slip Marker, K1, work the regular Raglan YO increase, K1, work M1L (extra increase), work to 2 stitches before the Raglan Marker on the far side of sleeve, work M1R, K1, work regular Raglan increase, K1, slip Marker. You have increased 4 stitches on the sleeve in this row, the 2 regular Raglan increases + 2 extra increases. Repeat this until you have 6 extra stitches on the sleeve, 3 extra sts on each side of the sleeve.  (56 + 6 = 62 sts on sleeve). Ta, da, an extra inch added to my sleeves.
M1L: increase of 1 stitch: With Left needle, lift the running thread between the stitch just knit and the next stitch, from front to back and knit into the back of the resulting loop.
M1R: increase of 1 stitch: With Left needle, lift the running thread between the stitch just knit and the next stitch, from back to front and knit into the front of the resulting loop.

Here's a little sample I knit with YO increases and extra M1 increases beside them. You can hardly see those extra increases!

But let's say the sleeve as written will be too big for you. What then. This is even easier!
Smaller Sleeve: If you need your sleeve to be 1" smaller, then when you have 1" LESS stitches on your sleeve than the pattern calls for at the bottom of the yoke, you just STOP INCREASING on the sleeve. Yes, just stop. As easy as that. Continue to work the regular Raglan increases on the Fronts and Back. (This also works for knitters who need a sleeve several inches smaller.)

Example: 1" smaller sleeve: At bottom of yoke the pattern calls for 56 sts in my sleeve. I'm going to work the yoke as usual until I have 6 sts LESS (1" worth of stitches in my gauge, even number) on my sleeve. Then I'm going to stop increasing on my sleeves as I continue to work the regular Raglan increases on the Fronts and Back, to the bottom of the yoke.

Bottom of Yoke Before Divide Row: Pattern calls for 56 sts on sleeve.
I'm going to stop at 50 sts (56 - 6 = 50 sts). That will give me a sleeve that's 1" smaller than schematic.

Now continue to work increases on Fronts and Back and simply knit across the sleeve stitches. I suggest putting a safety pin in the fabric of your sleeves at either edge to remind yourself that you are only working across sleeve stitches without any further increases. It's easy to continue on autopilot and forget. Experience speaking here.

I stopped increasing on the sleeve 4 stitches before the bottom of this yoke and continued the YO increases on the body. The sleeve takes a dive into the underarm which is a great advantage.

I know, I know, some numbers are involved but not many. Have you tried making this adjustment? How did it work for you?
A good fitting sleeve will make all the difference to how your sweater fits.
More FIT blogs: Go to Where is My Waist. ; Go to Ease, how much?
-Deb

Where is your waist?

I taught a "Get Fit" class last weekend and a question I always ask is "where is your waist?" Are you laughing yet?

We all know where our natural waist is. It's where you bend if you bend yourself to the side. You can also easily put your hand on your waist at your lower back. 

BUT... is that where your torso is narrowest when you look in the mirror? If your narrow part is at your natural waist, congrats. If not, you can still create a waist in your sweater.

There is no point in your sweater coming in at your natural waist if your body no longer goes in there. You are not alone here. I'm right with you. I am narrowest a couple of inches above my natural waist. You may be narrowest just below your bust. That's OK too. 

We're going to call this narrow spot in your torso your "sweater waist". That's where you can work some shaping into your sweater.

You can work decreases at the side seam (imaginary side seam if you're working in the round), one decrease on each side of the Front and one decrease on each side of the Back. That decreases your sweater body by 4 sts, approximately 3/4" in the medium gauges of yarn. I think working two sets of these decreases makes a very nice indent for your sweater waist. How far apart you work the 2 sets of decreases depends on how much room you have to work with. If you are putting your waist right under your bust you can work rows/rounds for 1/2" and do the second set of decreases. If you have more room on your torso to work you can work 1" of rows/rounds or more between decreases.

Work straight for 1" to 2" and then work the increases in the same manner back to the original number of stitches. You've created a lovely curve to your sweater.

The GOOD NEWS is that you can create a waist in your garment even if you don't have one. Your sweater is fairly stiffish fabric when finished and it will hold a curve for you. Yay.

If you don't have a waist in the front, you can work a waist on the Back only because all of us have a dip at the small of our back. This also makes a nice curve in your sweater.

If you need more room in the body Front, you know who you are, you can work the increases on the Front only, to accommodate a round belly. This also creates a curve and a better fit for your sweater.

A curvy sweater is better looking on everyone than a boxy sweater. If the pattern doesn't have some shaping built in then I would put some in. Create a curve. Even a small curve will make you look sensational in your sweater.

Do you add shaping? Tell me about it.

Happy shaping,
Deb

P.S. t_a So glad to hear from you. I'm glad to know you're lurking.

Where to work the Next Sleeve Decrease

I have a pet peeve. I don’t like seeing knitters mark little ticks on their patterns to keep track of the rounds they have worked. If you can learn to read your knitting you can be tick-free (pun intended).

Right now I’m knitting a sleeve in the round from the should down to the wrist. My sleeve shaping instructions are as follows:

Knit 7 rounds.

Decrease Round 8: K1, SSK, knit to last 2 sts, K2tog.  (SSK: Slip as if to knit, slip next stitch as if to knit, insert Left needle into fronts of 2 slipped sts and knit them together)

Repeat last 8 rounds.

I'm decreasing every 8th round.

The decrease I keep track of is the SSK since it’s easier to see. When you complete Round 8, the decrease you just worked sits below the new stitch you just made as you knit 2 sts together which is sitting on the needle. The Round 8 stitch is on the needle and the decrease sits just below it. Maybe the photo works better for you.

I’m going to do the next set of decreases on the next Round 8. You can count the rounds I've knit. A knit stitch looks like a "V". I'm counting the column of stitches above the SSK.

 Round 8 + Rounds 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 & 7. Now on the next round, Round 8, I'll do another set of decreases.

That's the explanation but it's not how I actually count the rounds. When I look at my knitting and this photo, I can see 8 knit rounds (column of "V's") above the obvious SSK. All I've done is renumber the rounds. The number of knitted rounds is the same as the photo above. In fact it's the same photo with the rounds counted differently.

When I can see and count 8 rounds above the obvious SSK (including the stitch on the needle), I work my Decrease Round on the next round.

I worked the Decrease Round. If I count the rounds I can see above the bottom SSK, there is a new SSK on the 8th round. It works.

If you need to decrease every Round 8. Knit around until you can SEE 8 rounds above the last SSK (including the round on the needle) then work your Decrease Round. If you need to decrease every 6th round, count 6 rounds above the last SSK and do the decrease round.

I'm almost sure you don't believe me but this totally works. The rounds are easy to see and count and I never, ever go wrong on my sleeve decreases using this method. OK, almost never, except during a really interesting movie. No ticks, no mistakes. Would I steer you wrong?

-Deb

P.S. I like the idea of a "collection" CathyK. Nice.
Robebe: Giving away yarn that someone else is going to work on and give to charity sounds like an excellent plan to me.

Ribbing for waist shaping

I'm not a shopper but I do venture out occasionally for an afternoon with my friend to wander and see if anything catches our eye. We can hit the expensive stores then and shuffle through the racks looking at garment shapes and style, under the eye of suspicious sales persons, without any thought of buying. On one of our excursions we found a beautiful sweater with the look of a frock coat. It comes in at the upper back above the waist and then fans out again. It was a long sweater which I don't intend to make but when we were looking at this sweater with the centre back panel we thought that pinching it in just above the waist by working straight ribbing might give a similar affect. 

- Cotton Tweed Just Navy

This ribbing is just above my waist, although even to me, it doesn't look like it in the photo. I put ribbing in at the sides too but the jury is out on that. It may be coming out. Not sure yet.

Now I have several more inches to work until I'll know if this is going to work. Patience, I hear it's a virtue. I read a quote which if I can remember correctly goes like this: It is not necessary to have Patience it is only necessary to wait. So I'm waiting and knitting.
- Deb

Make It Fit Friday - Moving Markers to widen Front

What do you do if you need more Bust room at the Front. For a Pullover, could we move the Markers to provide a little extra room? This pullover, from the Need A Circular Yoke, has the Front and Back of the Yoke the same width and then below the Divide we will add 2" to the Bust. I'd like just a little more bust room.

At the bottom of the Yoke I set up the Markers (removable ones) in the correct places as written, for the Front & Back to be the same width (same number of stitches). Then I removed and replaced the Markers for each of the sleeves toward the Back by 3 sts. Now the Back is 6 sts narrower and the Front is 6 sts wider than before.
A picture is worth a thousand words.

It's not a huge amount I agree. But every little bit counts. The Bust Shaping which is worked after the Divide Round will add some more fabric to the Front. I'll keep you posted.

Deb

Bust vs Upper Bust measurement to determine finished size

Which measurement do you use to determine the size to knit?

Do you work according to the actual measurement of your bust? The size of your bust then affects the entire sweater. The neckband, sleeves and bottom edge will all be calculated to match your bust. Also, in most patterns, the Front and Back will be the same width, half of your total bust measurement plus ease. Most of the time I think this works for lots and lots of knitters. But those of you who are busty have probably run into problems since your Back is much narrower than your Front.

Or do you take a tape measurement of your upper bust (measure your chest at your underarm level) and base the sweater size on that measurement with some ease added in? Would this work for you? This makes the neck opening smaller, the shoulders narrower and the underbust smaller. If you make no adjustment at your bust, you have a sweater with negative ease (snug across the bust) which might be great for you (especially if you have a smaller bust). Otherwise you must be ready to work some accomodation for your bust since it hasn't come into the equation for size at all.

The concept behind the Need A Plus Cardigan book sizing was a compromise since I don't know your exact measurements. What if you worked the sweater one size smaller at the top of the chest? That would give you an upper chest about 3" smaller. Then add 3" of fabric across the Front Only exactly where you need it.

On the sweater I'm working on now, I was very generous with the amount of fabric I added across the Bust. So now I'm taking away some of that extra fabric as I begin my waist shaping (which I have to start immediately below my bust, have I mentioned that I'm really short?!). I worked 2 sets of extra decreases on the Fronts Only in between my usual waist shaping decreases. This should give me a shapely Front!

Continuing to try out different shaping options. Any thoughts?
Deb
P.S. t_a, I'd love it if you could play the fiddle on my new decking. Wouldn't that be great.
lpm, yes, knitting and swinging a hammer in Northern Ontario, on the shore of Lake Huron.

Ease, how much?

We all know we have to consider Ease when we pick a sweater size to knit. There's a certain kind of fit we're looking for. The only measurement we use in the knitting world is the Bust measurement as if one measurement dictates the shape of your whole figure, but that's a rant for another time.

Ease is the difference between the finished measurement of the sweater and the actual measurement of your bust. A sweater that is smaller than your body would have negative ease. A sweater that is larger, has positive ease.
Somewhere between a sweater that fits like this (negative ease)

and this (lots and lots of positive ease)

is the fit you might be looking for.

If you don't know the exact measurement of your bust try it now. Take a measuring tape and measure around your bust at the largest point(s). This is your bust measurement for sweater purposes and has nothing to do with your bra size.

A lot of us have in our heads a certain amount of ease we should be adding (or subtracting) for The Perfect Sweater. I think my ideal is 3". I like my sweaters a little on the looser side, with positive ease. But I do have store-bought sweaters with negative ease, go figure.

I think we can all tolerate a much wider range of ease in our garments than we suppose. I've measured the sweaters I currently have on hand. These are all sweaters I wear consistently over the spring/summer/fall seasons. Two of them are sweaters on the needles now. The rest of my sweaters are put away until September but would fall into this range.

+ 6" of ease: Take It From the Top sweater in Aran weight. Great for cool evenings. Fits over anything I'm wearing.
+ 5" of ease: Basic Cardigan from Need A Plus Cardigan book in DK weight.  My go-to sweater. (My friend Dana is wearing it in the photo.)
+ 4" of ease: On the needles, orange pullover from Need A Circular Yoke book in DK weight in hemp/cotton.
+ 4" of ease: Lakeside Raglan Cardigan from Button Up Your Top Down in DK weight. Old Blue, old reliable comfy cardigan.
+ 2" of ease: Lace Cardigan from Need A Plus Cardigan book in DK weight. My dress-up sweater.
+ 2" of ease: On the needles, red sweater from Need A Circular Yoke book in Aran weight.

All of these sweaters have a different fit but they do all fit. If the neck and sleeves look correct then the range of fit across the bust can be varied from sweater to sweater, style to style, yarn to yarn.

What kind of range do your sweaters fall into?

-Deb
P.S. Seeing the sweaters like that, I have a very definite 'blue' thing happening! Gotta knit with some new colours.

Swatches can Lie!

Oh, no. This is terrible. Swatches can lie. Not for everyone but maybe for you and definitely for me. If you find that lots of your garments are bigger or smaller than you thought they would be, read on.

When you knit a swatch are you very careful? Are you looking at every stitch, knitting slower than usual? Are all your stitches perfectly formed and looking beautiful. Do you knit a large swatch? What happens when you knit while chatting with a friend, or as your mind wanders, or while watching TV?

You got it. Your gauge can change. When I teach classes I have the knitters work a swatch, cast on for their sweater and work several inches of their top down sweater. Then we check the gauge again. In every class, one third of the knitters have found that their gauge has shifted. Usually they have loosened up and every once in a while someone has tighten up.

What to do?!
1.  Rip back and start again with smaller or larger needles to get the correct gauge. I think we've all done this one.

2.  Continue on and work to a smaller or larger size to compensate for the gauge shift.

3.  For knitters working out of one of the Cabin Fever multi-gauge books there is a good solution. Continue to work with your New gauge and change to a new set of stitch numbers that correspond to your New gauge.

There's a very good reason I write these books. I don't get gauge and, I admit it, my gauge changes.

Say I started out working 20 sts = 4" (same as 5 sts = 1") according to my swatch. Now I'm 4" down my top down sweater and I discover that I'm really working at 18 sts = 4" (4.5 sts = 1"). Yikes, my sweater is going to be too big. At this point I can continue knitting and working my raglan increases as usual, towards the stitch numbers for the Bottom of the Yoke. But now I'm going to work to the stitch numbers for my New gauge instead of my original gauge (especially the Back) so that my sweater will fit.

The top chart is the number of stitches for the Bottom of Yoke for my size, assuming I'm working at 20 sts = 4" gauge (top chart). At the Bottom of the Yoke, in my original gauge, I want to knit until my Front has 44 sts, Sleeve has 60 sts and Back has 88 sts. BUT my gauge has shifted to 18 sts = 4". So I'm going to move to the line of stitch numbers for my New gauge (see shaded line on bottom chart).

Now, working in my New gauge, I'm going to work until my Back is 78 sts (instead of 88 sts at original gauge). This will ensure that my Back, and therefore my Front, will fit for my size at the New gauge which I will maintain for the rest of my sweater. I'm knitting at a looser gauge than originally planned, so I will work my Back and Front with less stitches to get my size.

This works for many, many knitters. It saves the stress of ripping out or recalculating all your numbers. Just shift to a new line of stitch numbers that correspond to the gauge you are now knitting.

Your swatches may be wonderfully truthful. You may get gauge and maintain it. I hope you do. But if you don't, these multi-gauge books have an added advantage for you.

These numbers are out of one of the Need A ... series of Multi-gauge books by Cabin Fever. http://www.cabinfever.ca/knittersbooks.html ;

www.patternfish.com/collections/73

Questions? I'm sure you have some.

-Deb

 Thanks for your comments. I really appreciate hearing from you.



Gauge, why you need to get it.

What is the biggest stumbling block to a sweater that fits? Leave a comment. I'd like to hear what your stumbling block is.

One of the basic reasons is gauge. There is a myth that the needles recommended by the yarn company are the needles needed to get gauge for every knitter. Not True. There is also the idea that most knitters get gauge. Also Not True.

For the record, I don't get gauge. Not ever. I am a loose knitter so if I used the needles recommended by the yarn company everything I knit would be too big. I have knit lots of big sweaters, sometimes really, really big. Do most of your garments end up bigger or smaller than you had hoped?

Back to Basics.  Gauge works like this:

The yarn company says that this yarn knits to 20 sts = 4" which is the same as 5 sts = 1".
If you are getting 4 1/2 sts to 1", when the pattern calls for you to knit 5 sts to measure 1", you are knitting 4 1/2 sts which measures 1", plus 1/2 st more. Now your 5 sts measures more than 1". Now your garment is big.
If you are getting 5 1/2 sts = 1" and the pattern asks you to knit 5 sts, you knit 5 sts which measures less than 1" for you. Now your garment is small.

WORK A SWATCH. It contains good information. Measure your own particular gauge with the needles recommended. It's good to know which way you lean, loose or tight. If you are off gauge by 1/2 stitch per inch, your adult sweater is 4" bigger or 4" smaller (eek!). It matters!

DO NOT CHANGE HOW YOU KNIT. "I'm going to knit tighter" works for about 5 minutes, until you relax and then you are back to knitting in your regular way. I will address this mysterious phenomenon in the next post.

CHANGE YOUR NEEDLES. I'm a loose knitter so I usually work with needles 1 to 2 sizes smaller than recommended on the ball band. If you are a tight knitter you may have to work with needles 1 size bigger. Continue with your swatch to see if you are closer to the gauge required by the pattern.


Next post:  Swatches Can Lie! Oh, No.

-Deb
P.S. Yes, new yarn and worsted too. I love worsted weight yarn the very bestest! I need to knit something up to show you. So far only grey is in production but more colours coming, one at a time, starting in September. Something to look forward to.

Bust Shaping

Good question Brenda (from the comments). I continue to look for ideas for Bust Shaping of women's garments. The idea that the Front should be wider than the back seems to make soooo much sense.
In the Need A Plus Cardigan? book we worked Bust Increases on the Fronts below the Divide so that they look like this. The Bust Increases are worked every other row.

For the pullover I have found that I can increase every round and there is room for more increases since it is a flatter dart.

It's interesting to discover more ways to work for a better Fit.
-Deb
P.S. What do you think, Brenda?
T_A, thanks for your lovely comments. I hope there will be some more information for you in the upcoming book. It's really coming along and I'll be posting some more photos as we finish up some more knitting.

Move the Markers to Adjust Sleeves and Body

I'm just writing the custom fit section of the new book Need A Circular Yoke (which should be ready in June). I had an idea for an easy adjustment to get a better fitting sleeve. Thinking out loud here so please wade in with your opinion.

After working the circular yoke, we come to the Great Divide where you put the sleeve stitches on spare yarn to work later and cast on underarm stitches so you can carry on with the Body. You will have placed Markers to delineate the Back, Sleeves and Front for the Divide Round.

Let's say you really wanted a sleeve that is 1" wider than the schematic indicates. You could move your sleeve Markers out at the sides 1/2" on each side to make the sleeve wider when you work the Divide Round.

This makes the Back and Front narrower. Additional width (add 1" on each side of the Front) could be made up on the Front with the Bust Increases to the correct number of Body stitches. The Back would remain narrower.

The new increases in this book give a flater line of Bust Increases which mean you could easily work an extra inch in the bust shaping.
What do you think? Would this work?
-Deb

Size It Smaller

Top Down garments really lend themselves to specific sizing.

You guessed it, Lyn is not a plus size but the cardigan from the Need A Plus Cardigan? book can be easily adapted to a smaller size than the pattern is written for or to work in between sizes. The smallest size in the book is for a 44" finished sweater. We made the green one 42" finished.

The green cardigan for Lyn, and the new blue cardigan for myself, are cast on as written in the book for the size 44". The Yoke was knit as written for the 44" size until I was an inch or two from the bottom of the Yoke. The adjustment for sizing is done in the last couple of inches before the Divide Round.

I checked the chart for the number of stitches required for the Bottom of the Yoke for the 44" size then contemplate my size change. I want to make it 2" smaller for a 42" cardigan. I want the Back to be 1" narrower and the Front 1" narrower.

The chart for the Bottom of the Yoke gives me stitch numbers for the Front, sleeve, Back, sleeve and second Front for the 44" size. I only look at the Back. If I subtract 1" worth of stitches (approximately 6 sts if using DK yarn for example) from the number of Back stitches in the chart, that would make my Back 1" narrower.
Bottom of Yoke Chart (pg.17):  size 44"  Back 96 sts
Adjusted for size 42" by subtracting 6 sts:  new Back will have  90 sts

When I knit to that number of Back stitches that automatically takes 1" off the Total Front too, which gives me a cardigan that is 2" smaller. Ta, Da, done.

I knit the Yoke until I hit the adjusted number of stitches for the Back and continue to work the Great Divide using my markers as a guide (because now my stitch numbers don't match the Divide chart). I cast on the correct number of stitches for the underarm cast on and continue with the pattern for Bust Increases, etc, as written. The Body of my garment is now the 42" size I wanted.

You may wonder if the back of the neck would be too wide since we're downsizing. On these cardigans the front Buttonband is picked up in one piece all the way around. When I knit across the my first buttonband round 1 decreased 3/4"-1" worth (5 sts) across the back of neck. Now it's narrow enough.

Do you need to work in between sizes for a better fit? That's really, really easy. Next to no math. I'll tackle that next. Stay posted.
-Deb

How can we accommodate the "girls"? A little bit of extra fabric across the front of our sweaters, in the appropriate place, would make for a better fit, wouldn't it?

If I measure myself, I am 2" wider on the Front than the Back. One way of adjusting for this is to add a line of increases on each side of the Front only. In this case I added 1 1/2" worth of stitches to each side of the Front. That makes the Front 3" wider than the Back. Since there is a pattern with ribbing down the Front I thought the extra inch would be a good idea, which it was.

 But I also discovered that increasing the 1 1/2" worth of stitches to the Front using this line of increases may not be so great if you are younger and perkier than I am. The line could extend past the largest part of the bust (it doesn't in my case but maybe someone else will knit this).

Some adjustment is needed. The other place to add a bit of extra width to the Fronts is to double up the raglan increases on the Front only for the last 6 rows of the Yoke. This would add 1 extra inch to the Front before the Divide Round. Then adding 1" worth of stitches to each side of the Front below the underarm is fine. This will definitely work well.
-Deb

 

P.S. Hi t_a, the machine knit tunic took me about 3 afternoons to do. I did do several bits of it twice since I'm still learning. I'm interested to see how long a second one would take.

Shape it for your figure

I finished my waist shaping and am happy with the results. I worked the increases so that the hip is a bit wider than the Bust. Also more increases on the hip were worked on the Back than the Front which works for my figure on a closer fitting top.

As you might imagine, waist and hip shaping can be endlessly adjusted. On this top I've made the Front 3" wider than the Back to accommodate the bust. The Front is on the right and you can see that it's slightly wider.

With a Belly:  I worked decreases to bring the waist in. I did the same number of decreases on the Front as I did for the Back. At the waist the Front is still 3" wider than the Back. This fits my figure.

No Belly:  If you don't have a belly then you might want to work more decreases on the Front to get to a place where the Front and Back have the same stitch count. You could start working decreases on the Front as soon as you knit past the largest part of the bust. You can work these decreases every 2, 3 or 4 rounds. When the Front and Back have the same stitch count the top will be 3" smaller than it was at the Bust. That might be enough shaping. But if you can, still work the waist shaping on the Front & Back as usual too.

Hips:  At the waist begin to work increases until the hips are the same width as the bust. Then you can work a couple more sets of increases if desired, to give you more hip room, as I did. I also, as mentioned, worked more increases on the Back than I did on the Front, to accommodate my back end. That gets me closer to the same number of stitches on the Front and Back.

No Hips:  You can work the increases to the width you need around your hips. Make sure you give yourself a couple of inches of ease so that the top doesn't bind at the hip.

Every sweater can teach you how to get closer to a good fit. What has worked for you?
-Deb

Went away for the weekend and did NO knitting. Very, very weird for me but restful. Read a couple of books instead and now I'm ready to tackle the end of my square neck pullover.

I did indeed rip back and work different hip shaping. After trying it on a couple of times I decided that what my figure needs is a bit more fabric on the back. This photo is of the ribbing running down the side with 2 increases worked on the Front (on the right of the ribbing) and 3 increases on the Back (on the left of the ribbing). One extra increase worked on the Back gives more room for my backside. I'm going to do a bit more so that I end up with 3 increases on the Front and 5 increases on the Back. I think that will work better for a close fitting pullover.

-Deb

P.S. You're right Brenda, unfortunately I won't have it worked out for all sweaters but I'd be happy to have it worked out for Cotton Tweed since I use it a lot.  I'll have to see if I can apply this method to other sweaters.

Chez Lizzie, I do a similar thing. There is a straight 2" section for the waist. The bottom of this section sits at the waist. The first hip increase is at the waist so the sweater width gets ahead of my hips. Seems to work.

 

Waist Shaping

Waist shaping, it makes a difference. I worked a decrease before and after the side ribbing on each side, 2 times, for a total of 8 sts decreased. This takes the waist in 1 1/2" and when worn it does create an hour-glass figure. Even doing this on the back only, if you don't have a waist on front, helps to shape the sweater. And it also gives you something new to work towards as you work down the body, which is also important. For the hips, I worked increases back to the original number of stitches (a little further apart) and then took the hips out one more set of increases so that the hip is 3/4" wider than the Finished Bust. If more hip shaping is needed, the increases have to be done closer together.

I've been playing with waist and hip shaping for my own particular figure. On every sweater I do it a little bit differently to see if the results make the sweater fit better. Eventually I will know what to do with all my sweaters! I think here, I could have worked the hip increases closer together since there aren't that many and a quicker hip flare would make the sweater look better at the back. Hmm, I think there's another frogging coming up.

 

-Deb

P.S. Comments: t_a  Ha, ha, just another day at the office.

Hi Ann, Long time since we saw you, hope to remedy that soon.

 

I'm adding bust darts in the form of increases between the underarm and the largest part of the bust. These stitches are going to add 3" of extra fabric across the Front only. You can see that the sleeve stitches have been put on spare yarn at the Great Divide.

 It all starts with one stitch increased right beside the underarm cast on stitches at the side of the Front. Two navy markers are set on either side of the cast on stitches. The light green Marker is the Bust Marker. The bust increases will be worked next to the Bust Marker so that the number of stitches between the navy and light green Markers will equal 1 1/2".

I'm working down the sweater and have added 5 sts so far on each side of the Front (5 sts between the navy Side Marker and the light green Bust Marker).
You'll see that I'm working the underarm cast on stitches in a rib pattern. These stitches will do some of the fitting for me. These rib stitches will expand a little at the bust and come back in for the waist. I'll have to decide if I want to work more waist shaping or not. A few more bust increases and that will be done. Then I can cruise along, working the Panels and the ribbed side stitches. Still lots to interest me as I work down the Body.
-Deb

How many shapes of sweaters have you tried knitting? What shapes are your favourite to wear, hand knitted or bought off the rack?

 

A-Line shaping where the bottom is wider than the bust in a gradual way.

 

A Straight sweater where the width is equal all the way down.

 

An Hourglass sweater with waist shaping.

 

A Modified A-line which accomodates the hips.

 

Have I missed any? I have every one of these shapes in my wardrobe, as you probably do too. My favourite to knit is the Modified A-line where I make the hip about 3" wider than the bust, because I need to if I want to button it up. But I do love the A-line shape so the striped cardigan I'm knitting is going to be that shape.

-Deb