As I was reading the pattern from the Creative Knitting March 2010 Issue. I realized that the decrease from from body ribbing to main body need a little bit more explanation. It is mainly my fault for not putting a clear instruction on the pattern. In the magazine, it mentioned to decreaes 4 sts evenly for the body back and 2 sts for the body front while working on the row 1 of cable pattern. If you are more experience knitter, this is easily accomplished to work the dec when working on the pattern; however, it might get a little tricky. Hence I have put 2 other way of doing the decrease in this post.
There is 2 ways to work the decrease from body ribbing to main body:
1) When working on the last row of the ribbing (WS) descrease 4 sts evenly for the body back ribbing and 2 each for both front ribbing.
2) On the next RS row after ribbing, instead of working in cabled fabric pattern, work in stocknette st instead for first 2 rows and work decrease on first RS row. Start working on Row 1 of Cable Fabric pattern on 3rd row.
I have also gotten question about how to go about working the sleeves from top down. The pattern in the magazine was edited such a way that it actually left out some quiet important information for anyone who might be a relatively new to the knitting world and might not be familiar with certain steps. I would like to add more details on how to tackle the sleeves. The sleeves are worked using magic loop method. First, with RS facing up, you will pick up the the number of sts that is specified in the pattern. If you are working on size S, you will pick up 86 sts. To pick up, you will start with the one side of the underarm (back or front) bind off sts first then work your way up. What I normally do is to mark the shoulder position, then divide the total number of sts to 2, so you will know you need to pick up 43 sts on each side of the sleeves. It is important to pick up all BO underarms sts; that is, if you BO 5 sts when shaping the arm while working on the main body pieces, then you would pick up all 5 underarm sts when working on sleeves, then pick up a couple sts, then skip 1 st etc until you reach the center marker; work the same for the other side of the marker.
When shaping the cap, you are working the sleeves as if you are working on a flat piece. To start shaping the cap, the 1st row is actually a WS row because you pick up the sts on the RS. To shape the sleeve, we are using the short row technique. 1) so for the 1 WS row, you will work 58 sts, wrap & turn, 2) then work 30 sts on RS, wrap and turn. 3) On the next WS row, work to the previous wrap st, pick up the wrap and purl the wrap with the st, then wrap the next sts and turn. Repeat step 3 until there is only BO sts left.
To work Wrap&Turn,
1) work to the st you need to wrap, on the RS, bring the yarn to the front, slip the next st as to purl, then bring the yarn to the back, then bring the warp sts back to the left needle and turn and work the WS
2) work to the st you need to wrap, on the WS, bring the yarn to the back, slip the next st as to knit, then bring the yarn to the back, then bring the wrap sts back to the left needle and turn to work the RS
To work the wrapped st
1) WS, slip the wrapped st as to knit, use the left needle tip and pick up the wrap and bring the slip st back to the left needle, purl to the back loop of the slip st and the wrap together
2) RS, slip the wrapped st as to purl, use the left needle tip and pick up the wrap and bring the slip st back to the left needle, knit the slip and wrap together
shape the sleeve cap until only BO sts left on each side, then you will need to work in the round, make sure when working in the round, you are working on the RS. As the pattern for the sleeves, it will match the body, so you will work the pattern into the sleeve cap shaping. The pattern is the mulitiple of 6 sts, and if you are working on size S for example is 86 total sts and it’s not multiple of 6, what i would do is to work the number of sts that can be divide by 6 in pattern, and the rest, i would simple just knit it. Since it’s an overall cable pattern, so there is really no center point of pattern to line up, so the position of the cable is really not that important…
If anyone has any question regarding this pattern, please feel free to contact me!
Kaleido by Silkie B. 