Tag Archives: amanda cardigan

Instant sweater No. 2

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Instant sweater No. 2

Do you remember back in January, when I told you a story that started like this:

Last week, my friend Meg and I were at a dinner party at a semi-fancy restaurant. We were seated at opposite ends of a long table and I heard almost nothing of what was said down there all night … except at some point I became suddenly very tuned into Meg saying something about how she never wears the Big Rubble sweater she knitted several years ago (and later modified to a crewneck). You probably don’t remember me going on about this one back then, or more specifically, about how I wanted to be the kid in the kids’ version. Anyway, it was like one of those scenes in a movie where the protagonist is in the middle of some crowded, noisy scene and the camera zeroes in on their ear, which is isolating a single voice from among the din. Or maybe I have some kind of knitter’s sonar. Whatever, I heard her say it. Naturally what happened next is I politely shouted to the other end of the table “CAN I HAVE IT?” Being the best friend a girl could ask for — and a knitter who doesn’t like to see her efforts go to waste — she shouted back “YEAH.” After which I asked for another sweater from her collection, which she also said yes to and I’ll tell you about later.

Um, yeah. It’s her Amanda cardigan, from the original Fringe and Friends Knitalong, which I had always coveted. So now it’s my Amanda cardigan. You might remember that back in October I had auctioned off the Amanda I had knitted to raise money for Puerto Rico. So the fact that Meg’s came into my possession three months later is pretty damn amazing.

When I brought it home, I put it into my blocking bin on the shelf in my sewing room, which is where I put sweaters in need of some attention. I’m planning to give it a little fluff up and either remove or change out the buttons (for something a little smaller). It’s one of several sweaters needing a tiny bit of TLC before sweater season kicks in, and starting to work my way through that stack feels like the perfect way to prepare for Fall and assure myself it will eventually come!

Thanks again, Meg!

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PREVIOUSLY: Instant sweater No. 1

Amanda reunion photos

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Amanda reunion photos

I’m back from the trade show, always an incredible time, but the absolute highlight of this trip was the fifteen minutes spent in the company of Amanda Knitalong panelists, wearing our completed cardigans. When I realized all five of us with finished sweaters would be there — me, Anna, Kate, Meg and Jaime (l to r) — I asked if everyone would be willing to pack a big cable sweater in their late May suitcases, and everyone kindly obliged. I really can’t tell you how cool it was to see these sweaters all together — how much the same they are and yet how different. I’m not sure the photos can even begin to do it justice, but I wanted to share them nonetheless. We were really wishing we had all the Amanda sweaters from the knitalong to line the entire sidewalk with.

Then yesterday, a year after this whole thing began, Anna wore hers on a flight to Manchester and my heart exploded.

Amanda reunion photos

Special thanks to Amber for snapping the photos!

Knitalong FO No. 4: Karen Templer

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Knitalong FO No. 4: Karen Templer

This is pretty silly, but since I’ve been doing all of the other #fringeandfriendsknitalong panelist FO posts as interviews — and to help me organize my copious thoughts on this — I’ve interviewed myself for today’s post! Please forgive me—

Your sweater looks a lot like the pattern photo but you actually made several modifications. Can you summarize them?

– Minor details: tubular cast-on, and I worked the diamond cables so they twist toward each other instead of all one direction
– Knitted it at a tighter gauge, so I knitted a larger size to get the finished dimensions I wanted
– Added a pair of reverse-stockinette stitches flanking each diamond panel (in other words, one stitch to the outside of each of those slipped-stitch borders) to give me a little more wiggle room in my final measurements
– Also added extra stitches in the lower back, to give me the extra width I need across the hips
– Because my row gauge was also smaller, I re-charted the yoke to give me more rows (to meet the schematic’s yoke depth) and re-charted the neck shaping while I was at it
– And I did not cast on the button bands along with the waist ribbing — I left that out and did picked-up button bands instead

Weren’t you hell-bent on doing vertical button bands with a ribbon backing and all that?

I was. Then I knitted this sweater — and nothing but this sweater — for four straight months, and to be honest, I wanted to be done. And specifically I wanted to wear it to TNNA, the trade show, and the only way that was going to happen in the time allotted was to pick up the bands rather than seaming them on. I can always pull them out and change them, but I’m actually really happy with how they turned out.

With all the stitch patterning, I thought it would be nice for the bands to have a distinctive edge, so instead of binding off in pattern, I bound off all stitches knitwise from the wrong side, so what you see is just the edge of that row of bound-off stitches. I love it.

What happened to that whole shawl-collar idea?

I’m super jealous of all the shawl-collar versions that came out of this knitalong — Meg really should lock hers up when I visit. But it became clear that this sweater was going to be somewhere between fitted and too small, and I think a shawl-collar sweater wants to be a little slouchy. Plus I thought back to the impetus for all of this and what I wanted was an ivory crewneck cardigan to replace a retired one, so that’s what I did.

You were knitting for Team Seam, yeah? Are you happy you chose that path?

Yes, I knitted the five separate pieces (two fronts, two sleeves, one back) and then, as written in the pattern, joined them at the underarm and worked the yoke seamlessly. Like Kate, I’m a little puzzled at this approach, since the raglan seams are maybe the most important ones, structurally. And if you’re seaming, why not seam the whole thing? But I was planning to rewrite the neck shaping and, if I didn’t get it right on the first try, it was going to be a million times easier to rip back and adjust if it was one seamless piece. So I went ahead and did that. But then I did something I’ve never done before (although surely someone, somewhere has) — I went back in and seamed the seamless raglan.

Sorry, you did what now?

The raglan “seam” for this sweater is just one stitch in reverse stockinette, which seems really vulnerable to me. It looks nice as you’re knitting it, but I could just imagine it stretching out and looking, um, less good over time. I think it’s more a concern with my fabric than for those who used light, fluffy wools at pattern gauge. Rather than go any further into how or why I did that, I’ll save it for a separate post, because it’s a concept I’m really excited about and will be doing some pontificating about.

But meanwhile, yes, I’m very happy the sweater is fully seamed because I want it to last and keep its shape as long as it possibly can, especially given the time I’ve invested. Like, I hope my great-nieces wear it someday.

You mentioned your fabric — you opted to knit this is in a wool-cotton blend, O-Wool Balance. Are you happy with that choice?

Totally! I wanted this to be a 3-season sweater, and I’m so glad I did that because I would hate to be limited to wearing this only in the depths of winter. It’s too good to be packed away! Cotton is weightier and less elastic than wool, and because I also knitted it at finer gauge, my sweater looks really different from the wooly ones. I might need a wooly one someday. But I love the Balance and how it turned out — the fabric is cozy and lovely without being dense or hot. Exactly what I wanted.

So is there anything you’d change?

If I had it to do over again, I would have been less impatient by the time I got to the neck. I specifically charted the neck shaping (see below) in such a way that the slant of the decreases could be maintained beyond the fronts and into the sleeve tops. So if I felt like the neck needed to be higher and smaller, I could just keep knitting and decreasing. I don’t like it when the back neck of a sweater is too wide — I think that’s when it slides around while you’re wearing it. I’m happy with my neck shaping — the actual curve of it — I just wish I had kept going for a few more rows to keep raising and narrowing it at the back. But it’s a minor complaint in the grand scheme of how happy I am with this sweater.

I learned to knit so I could make this sweater — this is what I wanted to be able to do. The fact that it was knitted in the virtual company of so many good friends and readers is icing on the cake. As I was binding off the neck in a hotel room in Phoenix, I became aware of the fact that the sweater started with Anna and me accosting a stranger at Midway last summer on our way to Squam, and ended with me knitting the neck while at TNNA again with Anna, with lots else in between. So I really don’t have words for what all is knitted into this sweater. The difference between it and some anonymous factory-made sweater is genuinely indescribable.

Knitalong FO No. 4: Karen Templer

There are more photos on my Ravelry project page. And Anna and Rebekka are still knitting, so stay tuned! (I can’t believe I’m not last!)

Bleached horn buttons and Knitters Graph Paper Journal from Fringe Supply Co., of course. Photos by my darling husband.

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PREVIOUSLY in #fringeandfriendsknitalong: A different way to shape a sweater

A different way to shape a sweater

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A different way to shape a sweater

Remember when I used to blog about what I was knitting? Back when I used to always be knitting something different all the time and had finished objects to show you?! Knitting one project for three months (and counting!) is hard on a knitblogger, but despite the copious knitalong posts, I haven’t actually posted much about my own Amanda — and I do have some things to tell you about it. Namely, how I created shaping where there is none.

Being sort of a stick figure of a person, I never mind a sweater that doesn’t nip in at the waist — in fact, I’m inclined to skip that part in patterns that have it. I have what my friend Rachel colorfully calls “UBF,” Upper Butt Fat. My bust is about 34.5″ but my upper hip measurement is closer to 38″. I like a sweater to have the same ease at the hip as it does at the bust, so what I’m always striving for is more of an A-line shape. I’m aiming for a 36″-ish bust measurement with this sweater — just about 2″ of positive ease up top — but that would be about 2″ of negative ease at the upper hip, and a tightly fitting waistband would not please me. Amanda has no waist shaping at all, because the honeycomb wraps around the sides and any shaping in the middle of it would be problematic. But sides aren’t the only place a knitter can put shaping! I’d been thinking about putting in some version of back darts right around the time I heard Amy Herzog talking about them on Knit.fm, which sealed my resolve. I’ll tell you what I did, but first I have to take a step back:

I’m already knitting this sweater at a smaller stitch gauge than the pattern, and am knitting the size large knowing (from the math from my gauge swatch) that it will wind up being very close to the medium’s measurements. My fear is it will actually be a little bit small, and it’s also my opinion that the design could use a little more “air” between the slipped-stitch columns and the honeycomb and button bands. So where the pattern calls for 2 stitches of reverse stockinette on the outsides of the slipped stitches, I’m knitting 3 stitches. There are four diamond cables on the body, and I’ve added 2 stitches per cable — flanking the slipped stitches that flank the diamonds — so I’m working with a total of 8 extra stitches on the body, which gives me about 1.5″ of extra circumference to combat my fear of the sweater turning out too small.

So to create some additional width across the lower back/hips, I added some more stitches between the diamonds and the slipped stitches. If you look carefully at the widest part of the diamonds in the photos above, you can see that on the first/bottom diamond, there are 4 stitches of reverse stockinette between the diamond and the slipped stitches on either side. By the time you get to the second diamond, there are 3 stitches flanking it. And by the third diamond, that’s back down to the 2 stitches the pattern calls. So I started out with 8 more stitches at the lower back and gradually decreased those out. Again, that’s only about 1.5″ of extra width — I was afraid any more extra stitches than that would be too noticeable in this pattern — but hopefully it will be just enough to make to me comfortable with the fit.

I’m finally just a few rows from the join, so hopefully it won’t be too long before I know how it turns out!

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PREVIOUSLY in #fringeandfriendsknitalong: FO No. 3: Kate Gagnon Osborn

Amanda neck shaping, part 1: Karen plots a shawl collar

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Amanda neck shaping, part 1: Karen ponders a shawl collar

When I’d been knitting for about three months, I signed up for a full weekend of classes at Stitches West, ranging from one-hour workshops on fixing mistakes, knitting backwards and continental knitting, to a half-day class on Tunisian crochet and a full-day class on the top-down sweater method. I’m pretty sure it was the fixing mistakes teacher I’m remembering having opened up the floor to questions at the end. Someone asked, “What do you think it’s really important to get good at?” Which was an interesting question, I thought. And the teacher responded, “Neck shaping.” Which seemed completely out of left field to me, being a total newb in a room full of newbs. I couldn’t imagine why I would ever need to know how to do that myself, and had no clue how one would go about learning it. OMG. Of course, I wound up inadvertently learning the basics of it in that top-down sweater class, and I’ve drawn on that ever since. I’m comfortable calculating the rate of increase on a top-down sweater, based on whether I want a crewneck or V-neck or whatever, and can turn that around for a bottom-up. Which is about to come in handy.

I mentioned back in our Meet the Panel post that I was concerned about the neck shaping on Amanda. There is only one photo of the sweater in the book (!) and the model’s hair is obscuring the neckline, but it still gave me pause. I looked at the project photos on Ravelry and it does seem to be a case where the neck doesn’t sit quite right on some people, with the tops of the button bands wanting to flap forward and outward. It’s because the neck shape is high, wide and shallow — almost like high boatneck. Buttoned all the way up, it sits the way a high boatneck would. But split open into a cardigan, those high fronts have nothing to anchor them.

We’ll get into more detail about this tomorrow, in part 2. But meanwhile, I’m here to tell you that it won’t be an issue for me after all, as I’ve decided to make my Amanda into a shawl-collar cardigan instead! Reader Callie C asked in the comments recently whether it would be “easy” to make this alteration — specifically, to give Amanda a Bellows collar — noting that she has not knitted a cardigan before. Easy is in the eye of the beholder, but I responded as follows:

I wouldn’t say it would be “easy” but it could certainly be done. The biggest trick is you’d have to change the neck shaping. If you look at the shape of the main fabric on Bellows, it’s a v-neck shape, with the fronts gradually sloping away from each other. You’d have to create that curved edge in order to do a Bellows-style band. For a shawl collar like that, you pick up stitches all the way up one front, around the neck, and back down the other front, and work your ribbing outward from there, and the shawl-collar part itself is created with short rows.

Given that they’re both worsted-weight sweaters, I would buy the Bellows pattern and compare the row gauges (its, Amanda’s, yours) to see if you could just use the neck-shaping numbers from Bellows and then work the collar from that pattern, too. But even if it’s not a perfect 1:1, you could see how Bellows is done and then apply that same thinking to Amanda.

… I should note that you’d be applying that shape to a raglan yoke (Amanda is raglan; Bellows is set-in sleeves), so it wouldn’t be worked exactly the same way as the Bellows fronts. …

Once she got me started, I couldn’t stop thinking about how great a shawl collar would be. Of course, no two shawl collars are alike: There are deep-V, narrow, professorial types, and high-V, super-round Peter Pan-ish types. I’m doing this despite the fact that the other two sweaters I currently have in progress — Channel and Slade (the poor thing) — are both shawl collars, but they’ll all be quite different. I think the shaping on Bellows is pretty perfect, but bought the pattern and the gauge is drastically different than mine/Amanda’s. I hadn’t realized it’s two strands of Shelter (worsted) held together and knitted at bulky gauge. Still useful for seeing the rate of the slant and where it begins and ends. (And I imagine I’ll be knitting Bellows one day anyway — especially knowing it’s bulky!) So I’m on the hunt for other patterns with good shawl shaping and a more similar row gauge — e.g. The Shepherd Cardigan! — but I’ll probably wind up just winging it, and redoing if need be. (Why row gauge, you ask? Because to make this mod, we need to concern ourselves with how many rows are worked within the yoke section, and figure out how many decreases to distribute at what rate amongst those rows. Plus picking up stitches along the selvage is about how many stitches you’ll pick up into the ends of how many rows.)

It’ll be awhile before I get to the neck shaping — I still have half my sleeves plus my back to do — but once I get to it, assuming it works out, I promise to share my notes.

Tomorrow I’m talking to Kate about her many mods, how they led to her set-in sleeve alteration, and what she suggests for tweaking Amanda’s neck shape.

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PREVIOUSLY in #fringeandfriendsknitalong: WIP of the Week, week 6

Amanda panel progress report: Let’s see these sweaters!

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Amanda panel progress repot: Let's see these sweaters!

I had originally planned to talk about joining the body and sleeves this week for the #fringeandfriendsknitalong, but am feeling like maybe we could all use a little Information Intermission. And I thought this would be a good time to check in with our panel and see how some of our sweaters are progressing. Rebekka, Amy and Anna are each knitting uneventfully at their own pace.  Anna is nearing the join and will hopefully have photos of that process for us to talk about next week sometime. But for the rest of us, it’s been a little more eventful.

That’s me up top: two front panels is what I’ve got. Notice anything? I’m determined to do ribbon-backed button bands, which I’ve never done before. Plus I want them to be knitted at an even tighter gauge than my ribbing. (I really can’t abide a flimsy button band, and am at risk of taking it too far the other direction!) So I’d been debating about whether to do the bands as written or knit them separately. After spending a couple of evenings studying Brooklyn Tweed’s tubular cast-on and figuring out how to figure out how to calculate my own cast-on for flat, 1×1 ribbing in that method, I then stupidly cast on the wrong number — and didn’t realize it until I’d knitted the whole ribbing. The good news is I had started with a front piece precisely because it’s the smallest piece and I wanted to make sure my tighter-gauge version of a bigger size was going to come out right. Still, I hated to rip it out and start again. But then I realized I actually had the perfect number of stitches if I were doing the bands separately. So I took it as fate making my mind up for me, and forged ahead. Knitting the bands separately will give me lots of leeway to screw them up, pull them out and do them again if I need to, or change them at any time — which feels good to me.

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Amanda panel progress report: Let's see those sweaters!

Meg Strong, Owner of KnitKnotes (Instagram: @knitknotes)

Meg has arrived at the underarms on her seamless body — but there was one notable setback: a dog ate it! Meg and her brother DG (now my right hand at Fringe Supply Co.) share a house and have the most docile pets on the planet. (I mean.) We stayed with them for most of two months this summer and I was stunned to see knitting and yarn left casually all over the living room each night. My cats would not be able to resist such temptation. So while Meg was watching this dog, she trustingly got up at one point to go to the kitchen, and when she came back the dog was standing on her sweater, using her precious ebony circulars as a chew toy. The knitting was collateral damage, and thankfully she was able to restore it. The circs were totalled.

You’ll also notice Meg’s button bands are of interest. At moments when she needs a little mindless knitting, rather than pondering a quick shawl, she’s been working her bands. Smart!

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Amanda panel progress report: Let's see those sweaters!

Jaime Jennings, Co-owner of Fancy Tiger Crafts (Instagram: @fancyjaime)

You remember Jaime had put a lot of thought (and math) into knitting her sweater at a looser gauge than pattern gauge. She ripped a few times to make adjustments and decided she didn’t like the sweater as much with less honeycomb. So she started over and is now knitting with the same yarn at pattern gauge, which is giving her a denser fabric than she at first thought she wanted. But seeing it writ large, she’s liking it! She’s also pretty much the fastest knitter in the West, so even with all of that — and a week off last week for Spinzilla — she’s ahead of me. She has set a deadline for herself of Nov 5, so she can capture it on her next ultra-photogenic trip, and I’m sure she’ll  make that goal.

Also, clearly her early trepidations about the cabling were unfounded.

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Amanda panel progress report: Let's see those sweaters!

Kate Gagnon Osborn, Co-owner of Kelbourne Woolens (Instagram: @kelbournewoolens)

If we were knitting on a schedule, or there were prizes for speed, Kate would be winning. She redesigned her back to have three diamonds and two braids, which looks great, but then she wasn’t liking how it played out with the raglan shaping. So she converted it to set-in sleeves! She’s a maniac. And no, we won’t be trying to teach how to do that particular alteration! But I can’t wait to see how hers turns out. I think she’s about 10 minutes from done.

So that’s the panel recap. Fill us in on your progress below! And remember there’s another big prize coming this Friday, so keep those photos coming!

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PREVIOUSLY in #fringeandfriendsknitalong: WIP of the Week, week 3 (plus new buttons!)

Team Seam vs. Team Seamless

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Team Seam vs. Team Seamless

It’s here at last! The official first day of Fall (sweet Fall!) and knitalong cast-on day! FIRST: I’ve posted a page where you can find everything you need to know about the Amanda knitalong (aka #fringeandfriendsknitalong). There’s a link in the right rail of the page if you’re looking at this on a standard (non-mobile) browser, but I also made the URL easy to remember: fringeassociation.com/amanda

Note that there is some new information there: specifically additional errata plus PRIZES and how to win them. So be sure to click over and check that out. For a chance to win, throughout this week leave comments on this post linking to your knitalong photos wherever they may be. I’ll announce my first WIP of the Week pick on Friday.

Special thanks to Anna Dianich for the photo of her gorgeous back piece above!

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Now, let’s get to casting on! Several of our panelists are starting with sleeves, but I’m going to keep the blog posts for this series in pattern order, so today we’re talking about casting on for the body — and specifically revisiting who is knitting it in three pieces vs one, and what other pattern tweaks people are making. Here we go:

WHO’S KNITTING FOR TEAM SEAM, AND WHY?

Kate Gagnon Osborn: I am, forever and always, TEAM SEAM! While I have knitted/designed seamless sweaters and find them to be useful, especially in colorwork patterning (Meltwater, Isadora, Adelaide, etc), seams in a garment provide structure and create a longer-lasting item. Many of the sweaters I design incorporate seams in some way: Erin, a heavily cabled cardigan in Savannah, uses seams at the sides and armholes to support the weight of the cables; Fable’s seams provide structure to balance the drape of the Terra; and Fargo has seamed set-in sleeves for structure and fit, just to name a few.

Another benefit to knitting a sweater in pieces and then seaming is that you can use your sleeve as a secondary gauge swatch. I will always knit and then block one sleeve first before diving into the body, just to be sure my calculations and measurements were correct. And, finally, since much of my knitting is done on-the-go — while in the car as we run errands on the weekends, sitting at the playground after work/daycare, at my desk as I wait for images to upload/files to process — smaller pieces are much easier to manage. And there is something very, very satisfying about seaming pieces and pulling the working yarn up and watching the pieces come together beautifully!

Anna Dianich: I am Team Seam because I wanted to go out of my comfort zone and I know I will have great support here with the expert panel. Also, as Kate mentioned, the seams will give this heavily cabled sweater some structure.

Rebekka Seale: I am staying on Team Seam! Mostly because it rhymes. (Jk.) I just really want to knit this as written. I haven’t knitted an adult-sized cabled cardigan before, so I feel like my best bet is to follow the pattern exactly this time, so I can know what mods I want to do next time.

WHO’S KNITTING FOR TEAM SEAMLESS, AND WHY?

Meg Strong: I switched teams! I had originally stated that I would be knitting the pattern as written.

What I have learned about myself via knitting is apparently I do not like to repeat the same process twice within a given project. The first cardigan I ever started, I was so excited, I worked the back, one of the fronts, skipped ahead in the directions and worked one of the sleeves, and then, I was done. The excitement was gone. But I still had the other front and sleeve to do! Same thing occurred when I knit my first pair of gloves. Can you guess what happened when I decided to embark on a pair of socks? Pair?? Over the years, I learned that you could actually cast on and work two pieces at the same time. Genius! So I would work the right and left fronts of a cardigan at the same time. Learned the magic-loop circular method so socks could be worked at the same time.

After studying the Amanda pattern, I decided to cast on for the left front, back and right front and work them seamlessly. There is no waist shaping in the pattern so nothing to modify there. However, I will work the sleeves flat (two at a time!) and seam them. The strength and support that a seam provides is not something I am willing to give up on my sleeves!

Jaime Jennings: I have to choose?! I mean, I don’t love seaming, but I’ll do it. I definitely prefer seamless sweaters. I love the quickness of knitting a sweater seamlessly — I can just get in my groove and cruise over all the stitches at once. I also love to try on as I go. I will usually look at a pattern and try to determine why it’s seamed and if I should keep it that way or try to work it seamlessly. As you can see, I’m not afraid to change things up in a pattern :) For this sweater, I’m going to go Team Seamless. I’m using a very hardy wool that doesn’t necessarily need the extra stability.

WHO’S STILL UNDECIDED?

Amy Christoffers: Well, I’ve been flip-flopping. Seamed sweaters hold up better over time and through lots of washing and wearing. They are often faster to knit because the pieces are more manageable and more portable. Also there is a bonus: It is far less painful to rip and correct errors for pieced sweaters then seamless sweaters. And in this case there is the urge to be lazy and not think too hard about pattern conversion.

Seamless sweaters are satisfying because they mold to the wearer, and bottom-up-raglans knit seamlessly are beautiful. If I’m going to knit a seamless sweater, this is my favorite way to do it. There is something satisfying about knowing that the fronts and back are all going to match because they were worked at the same time, although with no waist shaping that’s not really an issue for this sweater. Despite what I said about laziness, pattern conversion is pretty simple and there is something satisfying about getting the whole body of a sweater done to the underarm all at once.

Karen Templer: I’m also waffling. I’m tempted to knit it seamlessly for the same reason as Meg: I’d like to be done when I get to the underarms rather than having two more trips to make through those same rows. But my sweater will be very lightweight, and while I can’t stand a drapey sweater, I also don’t like one that sticks to your shirt and doesn’t hang. So that side seam will give some ballast as well as structure and longevity. I think I’ve decided to knit it as three pieces but all at the same time, on one long needle. Is that crazy? That way it is one trip and I’m done; I know I finished all three pieces on the same row, etc. The downsides are: 1) managing three balls of yarn at once, and losing that portability factor of pieces, and 2) my gauge is very different from the pattern gauge. I’ll be casting on the large knowing it will come out a little bit smaller than the medium. So the smart thing would be to knit one front piece first and make sure my sizing is as projected by my calculations. If I dive into all three and my calculations are off, it will be a lot more wasted knitting.

FOR TEAM SEAM, ARE YOU DOING THE SELVEDGES AS WRITTEN?
(i.e. garter-stitch selvedge for the side seams)

Kate Gagnon Osborn: I’m doing them all in stockinette. Since the pattern isn’t openwork and I’m not using a very slippery or drapey yarn, I don’t need the added structure of the garter edges, and since I’ll be blocking all pieces before seaming them, I’m not too worried about the edges curling.

Amy Christoffers: Stockinette selvedges all the way — especially for the button bands. Stockinette selvedges look especially nice on the wrong side, which is reason enough, but I think they’re easier to sew as well.

Anna Dianich: I honestly didn’t even think about not doing them as written.

Meg Strong: Although I’m Team Seamless, I still have the button-band selvedges, which I am working as written.

Jaime Jennings: I will work the button-band selvedge stitches as written.

Rebekka Seale: As written, for the same reason stated above :)

FOR TEAM SEAMLESS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING ABOUT THE SIDE SELVEDGE STITCHES?
(i.e. dropping the “seam-allowance” stitches or incorporating them in some way)

Amy Christoffers: You could work the honeycomb over the side seam, dropping all the edge stitches, and that would look nice on the body but might be awkward on the sleeves with the increasing. So I think that working a faux seam in stockinette stitch makes more sense.

So to convert the sleeve to the round I would drop 1 stitch from the cast on. To convert the body stitches to working seamlessly I would cast on: the front number (minus 1 side edge stitch) + the back number (leave the edge stitch at each end but work it as a stockinette ‘seam’ stitch) + the front number (minus 1 side edge stitch).

Meg Strong: I’m leaving out the side selvedge stitches — so only modification was to reduce my cast on, for all three pieces, by a total of those 4 stitches.

Jaime Jennings: I am going to leave in one selvedge stitch on each side and work it in reverse-stockinette stitch. I love a good faux-seam. I’ll do this as well for the sleeves.

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And now, dear readers, how about you? I’d love to hear your answers to the same questions. Please leave ’em below! And don’t forget to point me to whatever photos you post on the web this week!

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PREVIOUSLY in #fringeandfriendsknitalong: Jaime shows us her math
[For all the posts in this series, click here. For the knitalong overview, click here]