Knitting Daily : Pattern Adjustment

The Knitscene Galleries Begin!

KD Sandi — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 20:36:00 GMT

You Voted For Them!

Two weeks ago, I asked you to vote for the garments you'd like us to include in the very first KD Knitscene Gallery (what's a Gallery? see below). Your votes are in, and here are your top Gallery choices (in no particular order):

Ahlstrom Bodice by Lou Schiela
Brocade Leaves Pullover by Kathy Zimmerman
Dirndl Raglan by Amanda Furlan
Kaftan Dress by Salena Lee
Opulent Raglan by Wendy Bernard
Riding to Avalon by Connie Chang Chinchio

Today, we have two Galleries ready for you to enjoy (while we finish getting the others ready!):

Ahlstrom Bodice Gallery

Brocade Leaves Pullover Gallery

This time, eight Gallery Gals gathered in a tiny basement photography studio to have our photos taken by Ann Swanson, a talented photographer for many of our Interweave magazines and books. I bought a pretty curtain to serve as a backdrop and borrowed a plant from someone's office to give a bit of atmosphere. The new set-up gave us all a chance to really focus on making sure everything was just right: How do you show off a pretty bit of waist shaping? What is the best position to stand in? Is it better to take a front view, a side view, or both? And most important of all: What the heck do you do with your HANDS?

As you will see, we did a lot of experimenting with all of the above, in an effort to really show off the garments, their fit, and their style, to all of you. We had a fabulous time! We hope you enjoy the Galleries half as much as we enjoyed doing them.

Stay tuned for more Galleries: Coming Up: The Kaftan Dress, Opulent Raglan, Dirndl Raglan, and Riding to Avalon.

What's a Gallery? It's where I take the original sample garment from the magazine and persuade several women try it on and let me take their photo, to show you different varieties of fit and flatter. I provide individual commentaries for each picture, with suggestions for customization for each woman. There's only one garment for each design, so sometimes the sweater doesn't fit--that's where the commentaries get really interesting, as we explore why it doesn't fit, and how to alter it so it does fit!

See all past Galleries!

Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

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Sweaters Don't Lose Weight With You

KD Sandi — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 16:02:00 GMT

The photo at left was taken about a year ago. I don't look like that any more, mostly due to a very active dog (even with three legs, he can run circles around me and my pitiful two legs) and a husband who cooks mostly vegetarian fare. I must admit, it's lovely to lose weight. What's more, it's lovely to lose enough weight that folks at work start making jokes such as, "Oh my gosh, where's the rest of you?" The compliments are unexpected and make me blush (as much as a gal with native american skin can blush!).

However, as a knitter, I now have a dilemma. Several of them actually: All the sweaters I knit for myself in past years now no longer fit me. My favorite green hemp sweater, which I wore for those first editorial portraits: too big. My purple tank, knit out of ribbon yarn for my interviews here at Interweave Press: too big. The blue crocheted jacket, the knitted blue tank top--both Too Big. And, last but not least: The Hot Tomato Salsa, which despite all its lovely bust darts and belly darts, is now Too Big.

Thank goodness I realized what was going on before I got too far on my Gathered Pullover, or I would have another Too Big sweater to add to the pile.

I've lost enough weight this time that I think it's going to stay off (mostly--can we all knock on wood here for a minute? thanks), so it's not a matter of boxing up the sweaters and waiting for the next Fat Season to come around. And, although I am a really good seamstress, I somehow cannot bear to simply run a line of stitching up each side to take things in. Besides, I've lost about four inches off of Certain Areas, so taking in a handknit sweater two inches on each side would end up destroying some of the drape, the beauty, and the lines of the original designs.

I don't think bust darts are going to help me here, Obi Wan Kenobi.

I realize that I might not be getting a lot of sympathy--most folks struggle with the opposite problem: what to do with our beloved handknit sweaters when we gain weight. However, either situation points to the same dilemma: You've put hours and hours into a beloved sweater for yourself, and now it no longer fits.

What's a knitter to do?

I can let the blue tank, the purple tank, and the blue crocheted jacket go. The Gathered Pullover and I can have yet another little do-over session (sigh). But the hemp top and the Hot Tomato...Those two sweaters are part of my knitting history. They've worked their way into my soul, becoming part of who I am as a knitter. How do you part with touchstones like those?

Maybe I ought to frame them, to hang on the wall of my new studio in Canada. Yes, it's true: Later this summer, I am moving to Canada to be with my beloved Nicholas. Oh, I'll still be your Knitting Daily Gal, no worries there, I'll just be working remotely from our new home just outside of Toronto. So stay tuned for more rolicking adventures, on both sides of the border.

Meanwhile, I'm working on the Drawstring Raglan, which thankfully, will be more forgiving of my changing figure.

So: What do you do when your beloved handknit sweaters no longer fit you? Leave a comment and let us know how you handle this common, but still painful, situation.

-- Sandi

Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily.

What's on Sandi's needles? Shoulders of the Drawstring Raglan. What's on Sandi's spinning wheel? Awesome handpainted alpaca fiber that badly wants to become a shawl when it grows up.

We Do The Math For You: Free Bust Dart Worksheet

KD Sandi — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 18:38:00 GMT

Dear AnnR of the Comments:
		Regarding Bust Dart Math: You can do this. It doesn't take a genius. It's not really hard, I promise. Maybe the way I explained it made it seem hard, so today, I came up with a worksheet (and an Excel file!) that ought to make it super-easy for anyone. (I wanted to do an online calculator, but our programmers are a bit busy right now. Maybe later?)

AH, but wait. I have to give a special shout-out to Faye, the maths teacher, whose logical tweak to the formulas made things even easier than before. All the following are done using Faye's Fab Fix. Thank you, Faye!

So, here's that little worksheet for you:

There are only FIVE SIMPLE NUMBERS YOU NEED to bring to this math party; you and your calculator then sit down and figure out FIVE SIMPLE CALCULATIONS, and you're done.

Yes, it really is as easy as that.

And because I'm just that good, I have included an Excel worksheet that does all the calculations for you. It's not as spiffy as Jason's online waist shaping calculator, but we shall get there.

THE FIVE NUMBERS YOU NEED:

Full Bust Measurement (inches) ---- A

Under Bust Measurment (inches) ---- B

Gauge, stitches per ONE inche (sts) ---- C

Total number of desired darts ---- D
(Example: If you want two darts per side, the total is four; if you want one dart per side, the total is two.)

Distance from "side seam" to nipple (inches) ---- E

THE FIVE SIMPLE CALCULATIONS:

A minus B = F [Total Decrease Amount]

F times C = G [Faye's tweak of Total Stitches To Decrease]

G divided by D = H [Total Decrease Rounds]

E minus .25" = J [Location of Center Dart; see below]

J divided by 3 = K [Location of Side Dart; see below]

NOTES:

J is the measurement in inches from side seam to Center Dart.

K is the measurement in inches from the Center Dart to the Side Dart.

H is the total number of repeats for the dartly decrease rounds.

There you go! Dartage Alert! Don't forget to download the handy Excel worksheet that does the above for you--you can even choose inches or centimeters!

-- Sandi

Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily.

What's on Sandi's needles? I'm zooming up the shoulders of the Drawstring Raglan. However, I took a break this week to knit a leetle gift for a friend who is getting married on Saturday. (You better not be reading this, Barb...).

Bust Dart Math!

KD Sandi — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 20:37:00 GMT

I guarantee that explaining this will take far longer than it will take you to actually DO the math. Plus, if I were sitting right next to you, I could show you in a nanosecond. But, we have our friend the written word to help us, so here we go: Bust Dart Math!

For a top-down in-the-round sweater, vertical bust darts are lines of decreases that take the full-bust measurement of fabric at your bust and decrease it in size until it matches the measurement under your bust. Thus, we start off with:

1. How much do you need to vertically decrease?

You'll need two measurements of your own beautiful self:
Full Bust (FB): Around your bust at its fullest part.
Under Bust (UB): Around your ribcage, just under your bust.

Now, subtract:
FB minus UB equals Total Decrease Amount (TDA).

However, we need to convert that TDA measurement to rows/rounds and stitches so we know what to knit, right?

2. How much are we decreasing in each individual dart/decrease round? And then, how many decrease rounds do we work overall?

Figure out the stitches-per-inch gauge.
Divide that gauge into four (4 divided by gauge) because we are working four decreases for each round (two bust darts each side; each dart is a line of vertical decrease stitches). The result is the Decrease Amount Per Round (DAR).
To find the number of decrease rounds: TDA divided by DAR = Total Decrease Rounds (TDR). (Hold onto that TDR number for a bit.)

3. Where do you put the dart (decrease) stitches in each round?

Remember that we are assuming a top-down sweater worked in the round. Here's how we figure out precisely where to put the dart stitches in each round:

Make sure you have marked the midpoint of each armhole on your partial sweater. This marker is at the "side seam," so to speak. We'll do all the counting/measuring in relationship to that marker, so it's pretty important.
Find this "side seam" location on yourself, too. (Go ahead, cheat: Put on a thin shirt that actually has side seams.) Measure forward from the side seam to your nipple. This measurement, side seam to nipple, we'll call N.
Try on your partially-knitted sweater, and place a safety pin (carefully...) next to the stitch closest to your nipple (by "next to," I mean on the "armhole" side of that stitch). Count the stitches from this marker to the side seam marker and you have what we'll call Total Side Stitches (TSS). (If all the math works out perfectly, then your stitches per inch gauge times your TSS should equal N, but don't stress too much about this one, because your bust may be stretching the gauge out a bit!) NOTE: Use a safety pin or a marker that looks very different from your other markers to mark the nipple stitch, because you will want to remove this one before knitting and you won't want to get confused which marker is which.

Location of the Center Dart: (On Bertha in the photo above, this dart is represented by the BLACK clip.) This dart is easy. You want it to be about .25" away from your nipple, towards the side seam. Figure out how many stitches that is (use your stitch gauge or just measure), and place another marker at that spot. Whoo! Center Dart Alert! (Now do the same thing on your other side for the other Center Dart.)

Location of the Side Dart: (On Bertha, this dart is represented by the PINK clip.) This one is a leetle more tricky, but we can handle it. There are two ways to figure out this dart: using measurements, or using actual stitch counts.

Measurement Way: N minus .25" was where we put the Center Dart, right? Well, the Side Dart is placed at the point one-third of the remaining distance from Center Dart to side seam: [N-.25] divided by three equals the distance from Center Dart to Side Dart, measuring from nipple towards the side seam. Place a marker there for the Side Dart; do this step again for your other side. (See how on Bertha the pink clip is about a third of the way between her non-existent nipple and her "side-seam"? That's what I'm talking about here.)

Stitch Count Way: For this, you have to figure out how many stitches are in the .25" you used for the Center Dart above. Got that? OK, then: [TSS minus that number] divided by three equals the number of stitches between the Center Dart and the Side Dart. Place marker and repeat on other side.

(Note: On Bertha, her pink clip is a little bit further forward than the "one-third" rule. That's because Bertha's curves are about a B or C cup; my "one-third" rule/suggestion/guideline/loosely-discussed-between-friends-number is what I used for my D/DD cups. If you did the exercise with the hair clips and the loose tee shirt, you may have your own customized measurements for the placement of the Center Darts and Side Darts. Use those. They're all about you, baby!)

4. Now, the knitting instructions:

Remove the safety pin that marked the location of your nipple. (If you leave it in, you might get confused which marker is a dart and which is your nipple. Amusing, but not very helpful.)
Starting at the first "side seam" marker, work to three stitches before the first Side Dart marker, ssk, k1, slip m.
Work to three stitches before the first Center Dart marker, ssk, k1, slip m.
Work across the center front of your sweater until you get to the other Center Dart marker, slip m, k1, k2tog.
Work to the other Side Dart marker, slip m, k1, k2tog.
Finish this round, and then work one round even.
Repeat those two rounds (one dartly decrease round and one work even round) a total of TDR times (the number you held onto in Step 1).

There.

Wow. Know what? YOU HAVE DARTAGE!! Notice that the decreases will form vertical, diagonal lines that are actually quite attractive.

An example is always better, but we've run out of space to do that today. We can do that on Friday, plus I can start answering questions then, too.

--Sandi

P.S. Have something to add to the discussion? Need to ask a question? Leave a comment! I'm not quite actually and fully back yet due to Unforseen Circumstances, but remote access is a beautiful thing.

Previous Bust Dart Posts:

The Return of The Bust Darts

Introduction to Darts: Vertical and Short-Row

Bust Dart Placement

Getting Started With Your Bust Darts: Shoulders To Bust

Getting Started With Your Darts: Shoulders to Bust

KD Sandi — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 18:00:00 GMT

The First Step: Choosing The Right Pattern Size

For busty gals who want to use darts to help things fit better, here's a little trick: If you want a snug(gish)-fitting sweater, you can use your high-bust measurement, instead of your full bust measurement, to choose which pattern size to make. The fabric stretches over your bustline, then you use the darts to get things back down to proper size at your underbust and waist.

How To Find Your High Bust Measurement: Wrap the tape measure around your bust, just as though you were going to take your full bust measurement. In back, keep the tape measure where it is--level with the floor. In front, move the tape measure up so that it sits right at the place where you can feel your chest wall beginning and your breast tissue ending. This is your high bust measurement.

Why this works: You know how sometimes in the department store, you end up choosing a top that will fit over your bustline, but it's too big for the rest of you? Exactly. That's because, in essence, you just chose the top to match your full bust measurement, and not your torso measurements. Your high-bust measurement is (more or less) a measurement of your upper torso circumference. If you use that to pick a pattern size, then your sweaters will fit better in the shoulder area. Note to very full-busted women: You may need to choose a number that is between your high-bust measurement and your full-bust measurement. A (very) general rule of thumb: Add one additional inch to your high bust measurement for every cup size over a D/DD, and choose a size according to that number.

Don't Forget Your Ease! Remember our ongoing discussions about positive and negative ease? When choosing a size, keep in mind how much ease you prefer. My Hot Tomato fit VERY closely; I chose a size matching my high bust measurement minus about an inch (negative ease). So be sure to consider the stretchiness of your fabric (you did a gauge swatch, right?). In the Tomato, the large gauge of the cotton yarn stretched very nicely to accommodate my full bust. (Hint: After blocking your swatch, pin it down in its unstretched state and measure. Then unpin and stretch it to just before the stitches start to look overly distorted. Pin and measure. The difference between those two numbers gives you an idea of how much the fabric will stretch without distortion.)

Will The Fabric Really Fit Over The Ladies? If you have pickeed the right size according to the above guidelines, the fabric should stretch to accommodate the bust. Of course, the magic of a top-down sweater is that you can try it on as you knit. If you find that things are getting a little tight, work some increases to give yourself and The Ladies more room to breathe.

The Second Step: Knit Shoulders to Bust

For a top-down sweater, the process should look something like this:

Cast on the required number of stitches for the size you chose in order to fit the upper chest and shoulders area properly, keeping in mind your preferred amount of ease.
Knit according to the pattern, down to the fullest part of the bust. (Try on and adjust as needed.)
Work even for about one inch past the fullest part of your bust. (Less than a C cup? Work only a half-inch past the fullest part of the bust.)
Stop. You are ready to start the darts!

Third Step: Dart Game Plan

Here's a general overview of how the darts will work:

The darts begin just under the fullest part of the bust. You don't start right at the fullest part unless you want a very pointy shape. Starting about an inch (or half-inch) down from the fullest part allows a graceful curve to develop. (We like graceful curves.)

In a top-down garment, the darts form decreases from the widest part of the bust to the underbust. In other words, you want to start with the number of stitches which fit around your full bust and then decrease down to the number that fits around your underbust. NOTE: These dartly decreases are in addition to any waist shaping you might also be working.

I worked two vertical lines of decreases on each side in order to reduce the amount of fabric--and thus the bagginess--gradually and gracefully from bust to underbust. Two lines of decreases each side means two decrease stitches each side, or four decreases total per round.

And then...

Wednesday is Formula Day.

--Sandi

Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

Knit Cardigan Patterns From Knitting Daily: 7 FREE Knitting Patterns

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Bust Dart Placement

KD Sandi — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 18:00:00 GMT

Third in Our Series on Bust Darts...

For long-time Knitting Daily readers, this post might feel like a slice of deja-vu. There's some information that is just so critical to understanding how to do your own bust darts that I am borrowing some information from a post I wrote a year ago: Where The Darts Go. What the heck. It was fun the first time around, because that post was when we all first met Bertha...

Time for the Virtual Bust Dart Demo. Ready? Here we go. Yes, "we." This is an audience-participation exercise. Bertha will demonstrate, and if you want to find out more about where bust darts might work for you, grab a loose-fitting T-shirt of your own, stand in front of a mirror, and follow along. (Bertha promises it won't hurt a bit, especially if you stop now and then and wave at yourself and say "Hi, Gorgeous!" Flattery will get you anywhere, remember.)

In Photo 1, Bertha is wearing a loose-fitting T-shirt over her most comfortable, best-fitting underthings (or she would be, if she were a real woman like you and me). Note how the loose-fitting T-shirt fits her. The widest part of the shirt is at her widest parts, but the shirt falls vertically down from there, creating bagginess under her bustline. Although Bertha is a nicely curvy gal, she looks about twenty pounds heavier than she really is, because of the baggy factor. (An odd-but-true corollary: Bagginess right over a round little Buddha Belly can also make you look twenty pounds heavier. Just hold onto this thought for now.)

Bertha wants to be a member of Hot Tomato Nation, so I got some of those "jaw-style" hairclips and added them to the front of the T-shirt, pinching in the fabric so that the shirt is more fitted to Bertha's womanly curves. (See Photo 2.) The black clips are slightly off to one side of each of Bertha's "bustiest points," and the pink clips are about one-third of the distance between the black clip and the the midpoint of the armhole. (Photo 3 is a closer view from the side.)

Photo 4 is the infamous Bust Dart photo of my own Tomato-in-progress, so you can see that Bertha's black clips correspond to my innermost darts, and her pink clips correspond to my outermost darts.

The steeper your curves, the closer together the two darts should be—because the majority of the baggy fabric will be under the curviest part of you. The flatter your curves, the further apart the darts should be.

One-third of the distance between the first dart and the midpoint of the armhole is a good place for us larger-cup gals (C, D, and DD) to put the second dart of each pair. Truly gifted gals may want to consider adding an extra (third) dart (towards the armhole), whereas those with more subtle charms may want to consider having only one dart on each side.

Of course, you are your own Hot Tomato Gal, and if you do the above exercise for yourself, in front of a mirror (or even with a trusted friend and a digital camera), you’ll find out a lot about yourself and your curves, and you'll have that much more confidence when you sit down to customize your own handknits.

As for those Buddha Belly Darts: Yes, folks, I have a Buddha Belly, and I did in fact knit darts into the lower half of my Tomato in order to skim those curves oh-so-gracefully.

I bet you're wondering all kinds of knitterly stuff, like how many stitches in and how many rows and all that. Stay tuned for Dart Math.

-- Sandi

P.S. Yep, I am still out of the office, but still reading your comments from my Secret Location. Got something to say? Leave a comment!

Past Adventures of the Hot Tomato

You Asked For A Top, We Gave You A Tomato

On The Third Day, I Ripped

My Surreal Knitting Life and That Stripe

In Which The Commenters Chant: Bust Darts, Bust Darts, Bust Darts!

A Hot Tomato

Questions, Questions: The Darts and More

Increases and Decreases for Sweater Knitting

Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily. What's on Sandi's mind? Knit for your heart. It will do you good.

Introduction to Darts: Vertical and Short-Row

KD Sandi — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 17:00:00 GMT

The now-infamous Bust DartsToday we continue our adventures into the Land of Bust Darts...

What exactly are Darts?
Darts are ways of adding (or subtracting) fabric in a small area in order to create more (or less) room in a very small, very specific area. The darts are placed so that they give more room for your curves--belly, bust, and booty all can be helped with the judicious addition of dartage.

In knitting, as in sewing, if you work a decreasing dart, you are taking away fabric: decreasing the number of stitches takes away fabric. To illustrate this with ordinary fabric: take a fold of your shirt between your fingers and pinch it closed. This makes the area around the dart smaller.

In knitting, again as in sewing, if you work an increasing dart, you are adding fabric: increasing the number of stitches adds more fabric. To illustrate this with ordinary fabric: Imagine if you were to cut up along the seam line of your pants legs, and then sew in fabric triangles between the seams of each leg. You'd end up with roomier pants legs (bell-bottoms, actually).

How do you work a dart?
There are as many different ways to work darts in knitting as there are clever knitters to invent them. But basically, more or less, you can break them up into Short-Row Darts and Vertical Darts. (Now that I have said that, you folks will come up with sixteen other kinds of darts that I don't know about.)

Differences Between Short-Row Darts and Vertical Darts

Short-row darts are formed by working partial rows to "build up" one small portion of your fabric. Thus: You can work an insert using short-row darts on the armhole side of your bust, and this will give your sweater some room for The Girls. (You may also be familiar with using short-rows to build up the back neck of a sweater, or to make sock heels. In fact...sock heels. Think about the shape of those for a minute. Little miniature bust cups, right? Exactly.) Worked horizontally, these darts add height to a small section of your sweater's bust area.

Vertical darts are worked, well, vertically. They are very similar to tailor's darts that run up and down the front of some blouses--they nip in where you need less room, and increase to give you more room where you need it. Worked vertically, these darts add/subtract width across the front (back) of the garment. In fact, they are the same idea as waist shaping, only used more dramatically. The increases and decreases in waist shaping are worked once every several rows, to make gentle curves; the increases and decreases in darts can be worked every other row (or every row) to quickly add or subtract fabric. Generally, most of us do not have very much vertical distance between bustline and underbust, so the decreases/increases have to be worked very close together--every other row/round, if not every row/round. A line of decreases/increases worked so closely together in a vertical line forms a dart.

Me and my hot Tomato in progress

Where Can You Use Darts?

Anyplace that needs extra room or extra shaping. My home-economics teacher in middle school used to say, "Girls, you are not refrigerators. Mark those darts and use them!"

Bellies: If you have a round little belly, you can work vertical increases in a top-down garment from the narrowest part of your waist down to the widest part of your belly in order to create more belly room. (For bottom up: Work decreases from the widest part of your belly up to your waist area. Note that you would want to adjust the hem cast-on stitches accordingly.)

Bottoms: If you have a voluptuous backside, work your darts as vertical increases in a top-down garment from the waist down to the widest part of your booty on the back of the sweater to create more booty room. (For bottom up: Work decreases from the widest part of your booty up to your waist. And you would want to adjust the hem cast-on stitches accordingly.)

Anywhere: If you have unusual body curves of any type, a strategically-placed dart might be just the thing to help your sweaters fit better. A rather odd example: My dog, Buddy, had to have his left foreleg amputated due to injuries sustained in Hurricane Katrina. (We're not from there, we got him as a rescue dog months after the storm.) He has a pronounced "bump" where his leg used to be. If I wanted to make him a sweater, the bump isn't big enough to be a stump (thus warranting a sleeve), but it is big enough to make a regular sweater rather ill-fitting. I could use darts to shape the Bump region, thus giving him the best custom-fitted tripod dog sweater from here to Baton Rouge. (Told you it was going to be an odd example!)

Coming up: How to figure out Where The Darts Go; Dart Math.

-- Sandi

P.S. I'm still out of the office, but I am reading comments from my Secret Location. So leave a comment and let me know if you have any questions or nifty things to say!

Past Adventures of the Hot Tomato

You Asked For A Top, We Gave You A Tomato

On The Third Day, I Ripped

My Surreal Knitting Life and That Stripe

In Which The Commenters Chant: Bust Darts, Bust Darts, Bust Darts!

A Hot Tomato

Questions, Questions: The Darts and More

Increases and Decreases for Sweater Knitting

Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily.

What's on Sandi's needles? Remember: It's the Week of Knitting For Your Heart. Knit what you yearn to knit, instead of what you should knit, just for this one week. (I promise, the world won't end.)

The Return of The Bust Darts

KD Sandi — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 16:00:00 GMT

(I know you want to hear all about my adventures with the Yarn People at TNNA, but I am going to be out of the office this entire week. Thus, I have prepared several posts for you ahead of time which I think you will enjoy...)

Today, we begin a long-awaited journey into The Land of Bust Darts. Yes, I know it has been months and months since you first asked me to help you insert vertical bust darts into your sweaters, but what can I say. Knitting Daily has been a busy place this past year. Good things, like fine wine, take time...

Okay. Never mind the excuses. Let's get on with the Bust Darts.

For those of you who were not with us when we first peeked into Bust Dart Land, allow me to summarize our adventures-to-date:

Wendy Bernard made a Tomato. (See the photo at the bottom? Adorable!)
The Tomato was published in No Sheep For You.
Knitting Daily released the Tomato as a free pattern.
Sandi decided to make herself a Tomato.
Sandi did not, however, wish to have That Stripe go across her bustline, so Sandi moved That Stripe down, so it crossed just under her bust.
In the process of moving That Stripe, Sandi inserted vertical bust darts to make pockets for her, uh, assets, thereby giving her Tomato a little added fiery spice.
Sandi nicknamed her version the Hot Tomato Salsa.

And then all heck broke loose--in the comments, anyway. Everyone wanted to know how to put vertical bust darts into their own sweaters.

And here we are...

Why The Darts?

Let's stop for a moment to note that you don't NEED to work darts into any knitted garment. Not unless you want to. Wendy's original Tomato, for example, is a lovely, soft, drapey little knitted tee shirt that is quite lovely just exactly the way it came off of Wendy's needles. However, given my shape, I had doubts about That Stripe running across my bustline, so I decided to move it. (The stripe, not my bustline. I mean, there's only so much a knitter can do.)

This is where things got interesting.

If I moved the stripe down anywhere near my waist, I would run into the increases and decreases Wendy included as waist shaping. I really did not want to mess with increasing and decreasing in the colorwork pattern, as I figured I was fussing quite enough with the pattern, thankyouverymuch. I did not need to wrangle bright orange and teal herringbone houndstooth patterns into submission as well. So I charted out the waist shaping for my size on Excel, and realized that I could fit the colorwork band right into the "work even" section of the waist shaping. No muss, no colorwork fuss! Yay! (If you don't know what I am referring to when I say the "work even" section, there's info here.)

Once I had graphed that out, I realized I had a bit of a problem on my hands. If I just knitted the shoulders and neck as written, and then plopped in That Stripe near the waist shaping, I was going to have a whole lotta extra room for The Girls up top. There was going to be so much extra fabric, in fact, that the top would look silly: fitted shoulders, loose bust, fitted waist, fitted hips.

Not exactly a Hot Tomato.

That's when I realized I needed some darts to help shape things up a bit.

You won't want to miss the next few posts. I'm going to go over vertical darts, what they are, how to use them, and of course, The Math, so you can become a Master of Vertical Dartage. (And just a note to those who think that they can skip the next few posts since they don't need bust darts: Do you have a little round belly, or do you knit for someone who has one? Then I have two words for you: Belly Darts. Maybe you have junk in the trunk? Booty Darts. Yep. Trust me. Darts are a curvy person's best friend.)

Oh, and I may be out of the office, but I'm still reading comments from wherever I am. So leave a comment and let me know if you have any questions or feedback.

-- Sandi

P.S. Some of you might be wondering why I constantly use cute little euphemisms like "The Girls" or "Booty." Well, sure it's fun, but it also helps keep these Knitting Daily emails out of your spam box; and it helps keep the whole Knitting Daily website from getting blacklisted by parental control software. Yep, I'm a silly gal, but sometimes there is also a method to my silliness.

Past Adventures of the Hot Tomato

You Asked For A Top, We Gave You A Tomato

On The Third Day, I Ripped

My Surreal Knitting Life and That Stripe

In Which The Commenters Chant: Bust Darts, Bust Darts, Bust Darts!

A Hot Tomato

Questions, Questions: The Darts and More

Increases and Decreases for Sweater Knitting

Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

Knit Cardigan Patterns From Knitting Daily: 7 FREE Knitting Patterns

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Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

KD Sandi — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 21:18:00 GMT

Obviously, when I knit Susan's Bulletproof Sweater at age 14, I had no concept that there was anything much beyond color to consider when choosing a yarn. I just pretty much thought that you used whatever yarn you wanted to for a sweater; and then you sweated and said bad words your mother would cringe at until you managed to produce a gauge swatch that was somewhere in the territory decreed by the gauge statement in the pattern. Once you got gauge, then whoo! you were ready to cast on! And that was it--right?

Clearly not, or Susan's Sweater would not be bulletproof.

Once I bought that charming creamy acrylic yarn, I worked very hard to get the pattern's gauge of six stitches per inch. I kept changing needle sizes, going to smaller and smaller needles until I finally got a decent swatch with the elusive six stitches per inch. I remember being really frustrated, trying to scrunch ever more stitches into the space on my stitch gauge, knitting every more tightly, until finally I got the magic number.

However, the yarn, a worsted weight, was just too thick. Those six stitches per inch were jammed in next to each other, with no room to breathe, and no room to move. Thus, even though I eventually got the correct gauge, THAT yarn at THAT gauge gave me the wrong type of fabric--so for this project both the gauge and the yarn were definitely wrong for each other.

That's how I learned about Drape. Drape, loosely defined, is the ease with which stitches are able to move past each other. The more easily the stitches can move against each other, the more the fabric flows and the more drape the fabric has. If the stitches cannot move against each other, then you have stiff body armor--and thus, no drape, and a sweater like Susan's, that could stand up with arms outstretched even without Bertha's help.

The Drape Mistake is a very common one, made even by folks over fourteen not blinded by a girlfriend crush. We fall in love with a yarn, and we are determined to use it to knit a favorite pattern. We mess around with the gauge until we get something "close enough"--and we completely forget that gauge is only part of the story when trying to substitute yarn.

In other words: If you are trying to substitute yarns, don't stop with the swatch. Got gauge? Good for you. Knit on that swatch some more. Knit until you have a largish swatch, and then live with that swatch for a bit. Carry it around in your pocket. Pin it up on your wall. Scrunch it and stretch it and wave it in the air like a queen's hankie. Wash it and dry it and then repeat the above with abandon.

Did you knit a swatch of Kevlar? If so, maybe you need a thinner yarn. Did you knit a lacy mesh washcloth? If so, maybe you need a thicker yarn. Or did you knit a swatch worthy enough to grace a lovely, creamy movie-star pullover? Ah, then perhaps you have found the yarn of your dreams.

Only your swatch will know for sure.

-- Sandi

By the way--

Thank you for all your wonderful comments on Monday's post. They really touched me--all those stories of sweaters-gone-wrong, all sweaters made with such love.
Next: Why, yes, I did get my hair cut--and dyed! The color is called Violet Expresso, so it's dark dark dark (what else?) chocolate brown with just a sheen of (what else?) purple. Thank you for all the lovely compliments. They quite made my day!

And finally: Some of you asked,"Well, if this is the Second Sweater You Ever Knit, where is the First Sweater You Ever Knit?" Um. It's in the garage. In a box. There are many boxes in Sandi's garage, so we'll all just have to be patient until the First Sweater shows up. (I knit that one when I was ten, so it will be worth a post of its own, methinks.)

Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

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Tips for Working Tricky Armholes

KD Sandi — Tue, 27 May 2008 19:19:00 GMT

Working a Tricky Armhole: The Drawstring Raglan


	The Drawstring Raglan on Stef

People are used to knitting raglans from the top-down, but the Drawstring Raglan is done from the bottom up, and I'm noticing a lot of emails asking for help at the part where you cast on extra stitches for the sleeves.

What's going on in this section: Knit the front stitches to the midpoint of the underarm, then cast on stitches for the sleeve, then knit across the back to the midpoint of the other armhole, cast on stitches for the next sleeve, and knit across the front.

The challenge: There are no extra stitches to form the base of the armhole between the front and back of the sleeve. Let's say I'm going to knit the 40" size. The front of the sleeve starts after stitch 55 and the back of the sleeve connects to stitch 56. When you knit around from front to sleeve to back, the strands between stitches 55 and 56 get distorted and pulled out of shape.

One solution: This is from Katie Himmelberg, assistant editor of Interweave Knits: “If you’re working on a circular needle as the pattern suggests, after casting on the stitches, slide as many as possible to the cord portion of the circular (this will include the last stitch from the body) before knitting the next body stitch. This will help alleviate the strain on that stitch.”

However, if that still isn't working out for you, maybe there's another way. Putting on my problem-solving hat, I realize that people are stymied by having only two stitches at the actual underarm--one before the sleeve stitches and one after. What if we added in a few more stitches there? Perhaps we could do a very slight modification, a la Elizabeth Zimmermann...

Let's create an actual underarm!

How many armhole stitches? EZ's formulas suggest that an underarm be about 8% of the total body stitches. I'm going to use the total body stitches after the decreases at the waist, rather than those at the hem, because the waist stitches reflect a more accurate body fit. So: 220 stitches for the size 40. 8% of 220 is about 18 stitches, which is about 3" of armhole according to the gauge. That seems monster huge to me, based on this pattern's style and cut, so I am going to cut that down by half to 9 stitches. So: The base of my armhole will be 9 stitches wide. 5 of the 9 stitches will come from each front panel and the remaining 4 stitches will come either side of the back. (I want the armhole slightly wider at the fronts in order to accommodate the pull of my bust.)

Stitch count for each front: Pattern specifies working 55 stitches to sleeve. 55 minus 5 equals 50.

Stitch count for the back: Subtract 4 stitches for each side: 110 minus 8 equals 102.

Here's how I proceed:

On the WS row just before casting on for the sleeves, work as follows for the 40" (modify your stitch counts as needed for your particular size)

Next Row: (WS) Work 50 stitches across front in pattern. Leave those 50 stitches on a holder or spare circular needle. Bind off the next 9 stitches for underarm. Work 102 back stitches. BO 9 nine sts for underam. Work remaining 50 stitches for other front. Check stitch counts: 50 + 9 + 102 + 9 + 50 = 220.

Next Row: (RS) Knit 50 stitches across front. Cast on the 70 sts required for the sleeve, rejoin knitting to the back stitches and knit across back. Cast on the 70 stitches for the second sleeve, rejoin knitting to other front and continue knitting to end.

If this still seems awkward to you using only one long circular needle, you can put the sleeve stitches on dpns and knit the body stitches on circulars.

And finally: If you still get loose stitches at the underarms no matter what you do, you could work some duplicate stitches over that area to help tighten things up. Or, you could even work a row of single crochet there to ensure that the loose stitches did not become looser over time.

Could you work this pattern from the top down?

Well, sure. The one thing you might have to do is flip the order of the lace pattern rows--you still want the actual lace row nearer the top of the garment, so this would be come Row 2 instead of Row 4. The other caveat is that you might not get the nice scalloped edge at the hem if you are working top down.

What about you? Do you have any suggestions or ideas for tricky underarms? Leave a comment!

-- Sandi

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Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

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Shaping Lace: Increasing

KD Sandi — Thu, 15 May 2008 17:20:00 GMT

On Monday, we talked about decreasing in lace; today, we'll talk about increasing in a lace pattern. Remember these helpful tips:

Lace pattern from the Apres Surf Hoodie

Again, let's use this simple lace pattern as our example:

Row 1: *K1, yo, k2, ssk, k2tog, k2, yo; rep from * to end.
Row 2: Purl.

As we did on Monday, we find that when you "pair up" the decreases and yarnovers, you can see that this pattern has two halves to it:

K1, yo, k2, ssk —— and then —— k2tog, k2, yo.

To work the first half properly, you need five stitches; to work the second half properly, you need four stitches. So besides noting where the "pairs" are, you also need to note where they are in relationship to each other. It helps to break the pattern up into sections, with one yarnover/decrease pair per section.

Now we're ready to start increasing. For simplicity, we're only going to talk about increasing (using a simple M1) at the beginning of Row 1.

After a total of four increase rows, we have four extra stitches outside the first lace repeat, as follows:

First inc row:

Second inc row:

Third inc row:

Fourth inc row:

Now we have enough to work the second half of the lace pattern AND continue the increasing, as follows:

Fifth inc row:

Here's how the next few increase rows would play out:

Sixth inc row:

Seventh inc row:

Eighth inc row:

Ninth inc row:

Tenth inc row:

You've now added an extra repeat to the beginning of each row.

Icelandic Shawl

You can use this same logic to work out increases at the end of a row, just as you can use the logic presented on Monday to work out decreases at the end of a row. It does get a little hairy to try and do this on the fly, however, so I highly recommend either charting things out, or writing out the shaping rows before you plunge into the knitting, just to save your sanity.

The overall trick is to recognize one of two situations:

(1) When you don't have enough stitches near the edge to work both the paired decrease/yarnover for the lace pattern AND the decrease you need to work for the shaping. If you have enough stitches to do both, do both. If you don't, then bye-bye lace pattern, hello plain stockinette.

(2) When you have enough extra stockinette stitches to work a part of the lace pattern properly. You might be able to work only half of the pattern, but that's enough to keep the lace pattern contiguous.

Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

Knitting Lace: Knitting Daily Presents 7 Free Knitted Lace Patterns

Are you addicted to lace knitting? Or maybe you've admired some of the gorgeous knitted lace patterns out there and want to give lace knitting a try? Here are seven of Interweave's top knitted lace patterns, gathered together in one FREE ebook for you.

Whether you are a first time lace knitter, or a seasoned expert, you'll enjoy the timeless beauty of knitting lace. Get these stunning projects that will continue to inspire, and be loved for generations to come. You'll want to make every one of these lace patterns, so download your free eBook now and get started (and don't forget to tell a friend so they can enjoy their own copy!)

Download Your Free Lace Patterns Today

Shaping Lace: Decreasing

KD Sandi — Sun, 11 May 2008 17:17:00 GMT

One of the most-asked questions in knitting land is: How do I do shaping in lace? Great question, as lace already has decreases and increases all over the place! How do you add extra decreases or increases without messing up the prettiness?

Papyrus Lace from Lace & Eyelets

One easy way is to use changes in needle size to accomplish your shaping—this way, no extra increases/decreases are needed. Let the gauge do the heavy lifting, in other words.

If, however, you are using a pattern where gauge changes aren't suitable, then you have to figure out how to add the increases and decreases into the lace pattern itself.

Lace patterns are (usually) formed by paired increases and decreases: for every yarnover, somewhere nearby there is a decrease. It helps to use a pencil to lightly circle the paired decreases/yarnovers in your pattern so you can clearly see which stitches "belong together."

These pairs are critical in terms of maintaining both the integrity of the lace pattern and the overall stitch count of the row. Always keep these pairs together. If you don't have enough stitches to work an entire pair, then forget about working the pair and treat the stitches as though they were plain stockinette.

Example: Decreasing

Let's use this simple lace pattern as our example:

Row 1: *K1, yo, k2, ssk, k2tog, k2, yo; rep from * to end.
Row 2: Purl.

When you "pair up" the decreases and yarnovers, you can see that this pattern has two halves to it:

K1, yo, k2, ssk —— and then —— k2tog, k2, yo.

To work the first half properly, you need five stitches; to work the second half properly, you need four stitches. So besides noting where the "pairs" are, you also need to note where they are in relationship to each other. It helps to break the pattern up into sections, with one yarnover/decrease pair per section.

Now we're ready to start decreasing. For simplicity, we're only going to talk about decreases at the beginning of Row 1.

Notice that a decrease at the beginning of that row will use up both the k1 and the first stitch of the k2, "stepping over" the space where you normally would work a yarnover. The solution? Forget about the yarnover AND its mate, the ssk, treating the ssk as two stockinette stitches. In fact, while you work your decrease, you are going to treat that entire first half as five stockinette stitches, as follows:

the initial k1 and first half of the original k2

the second half of the original k2

the original ssk

After the first decrease row, you no longer have enough stitches to work the first half of the lace pattern (you have four, you need five), so work them as stockinette. (However, you can continue to work the second half—the next four stitches—in the lace pattern.) On subsequent rows, work decreases as needed in that stockinette block until you arrive at a row where you have to use the first stitch of the k2tog (in the second half of the repeat) for part of the next decrease. On that row, you'd then treat all four of the second-half stitches as stockinette.

Here are the decrease rows written out for clarity's sake:

Row 1:

Row 2 and all wrong side rows:

Row 3:

Row 5:

Row 7:

Row 9:

Row 11:

Row 13:

And you can take it from there yourselves!

Sandi Wiseheart is the founding editor of Knitting Daily. She is now the author of the popular Knitting Daily blog: What's on Sandi's Needles.

Knitting Lace: Knitting Daily Presents 7 Free Knitted Lace Patterns

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Knitting for Men: Modifying the Brick Pullover

KD Sandi — Tue, 06 May 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Kathy Zimmerman's Brick Pullover on T.J.

You folks are such a hoot. All day yesterday, folks around the office were quoting your comments on Monday's Men of Interweave Gallery to each other. I am pleased to announce that the comments included our very first Knitting Daily proposal of marriage (an arranged marriage, but still); and many, many exclamations of admiration for our four male models.

I must say, there was quite a lot of giggling here.

Modifications for the Brick Pullover

Now, down to serious business. You asked some great questions about modifying the Brick Pullover from the Summer 2008 issue of Knits, so let me try to give you some hopefully great answers!

Can you show us a photo of this sweater on a woman? Sure. I've added a photo of me-wearing-The-Brick, plus the usual commentary, to the Brick Pullover Gallery.

The neck looks as though it is being pulled down too low in the back. Adrienne B. and Terrie R. both asked if it would be possible to add some short-row shaping (a la Elizabeth Zimmermann) in the back to remedy this.

On this particular sweater, you cannot add short-rows horizontally across the back "yoke," as each shoulder/yoke section is worked from side to center, as an extension of the sleeves, not from the bottom up or top down. (Read through the construction notes at the top of the Gallery page; you will see that there is a vertical seam connecting both shoulder pieces at center back.)

You could, however, work fewer bind-off rows when shaping the back neck. So for example, in the pattern, at Shape Back Neck, work to the point where it tells you to "bind-off 2 sts at back neck edge three times." If you "bind off 2 sts at neck edge" only twice, then you have two additional columns of stitches that run the full length across the back neck, raising the back neck by the width of two stitches.

The back neck section

And Now: The Question of Beer Bellies

Sharon H. asks: "My husband has a rather large belly. I know what to do for women's shaping, but I can never find anything about different men's shapes. Any hints?"

Well, men are just human beings, after all. Bodies are just bodies, right? And a beer belly is just one sort of curve, yes? All right then. Although shaping for men is non-traditional, perhaps this is one tradition it is time to let go of, in the interests of better-fitting clothing for all you wonderful men out there, knitters or no.

If you were knitting for a woman with a large belly, you'd add short rows, or increase/decrease to give some waist shaping, for example. However, for a sweater like this one with a distinct pattern over the belly, you can't really add short-rows (regardless of whether you were knitting it for a man or for a woman). The pattern stitch is "in the way," so to speak; the short-rows would show. You cannot add "belly darts" here for the same reason.

Since the Brick Pullover is worked hem upwards, what about casting on the number of stitches corresponding to beer-belly-plus-ease, then working decreases on the way up (at the sides, where they won't show), so that when you get to the chest area, the stitch count is closer to manly-chest-plus-ease?

Bertha says rust is not her color...

Yes, this is the same sort of math one does for waist shaping, so you could even use the Waist Shaping Calculator, I suppose. Differences: You aren't working an hourglass; you'd want the shaping to be gradual and subtle; the narrowest part isn't necessarily the waist; and you (probably...) won't be increasing back up to accommodate a "bust." Other than that: It's Just Math. We've talked about fearlessly using our shaping skills for women's sweaters; why shouldn't we use our knitterly math skills to make men's sweaters more comfortable and flattering, too?

And finally, my favorite comment:

What, no Bert? Bertha must be lonely! (Laura S.)

Welll..Bertha really wants to focus on her career right now, so I'm not sure she's ready for a boyfriend. However, I have been thinking about getting Bertha a "big sister" once the budget allows...

Do you have any questions or suggestions about adjusting this sweater to fit yourself or someone you love? Leave a comment!

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Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily.

What's on Sandi's needles? With a couple of projects marinating in the Naughty Corner, I went back to knitting socks. When all else fails, knit socks.

Finally: A Gallery With Men In It!

KD Sandi — Sun, 04 May 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Today, I am pleased to present to you: The Men of Interweave, wearing Kathy Zimmerman's Brick Pullover.

Aaron in his red carpet moment

It was much easier to get the guys to pose for gallery photos than I thought it would be. I had imagined having to promise free pizza; but Mark, T.J., Aaron, and Eric were actually a bit excited about being included. (Aaron kept talking about his moment of stardom and how it might lead to "bigger things." I felt badly about that—I mean, this is a knitting site. It's not like there are casting directors scanning our galleries for the next Harrison Ford. Sorry, Aaron. But if anyone knows Ryan Seacrest or Simon Cowell, could you please give them a ring on Aaron's behalf? Thanks.)

More men are knitting than ever before, and it's been pointed out to me that I tend to address only the women knitters, leaving the guy knitters feeling a bit slighted. So, men, this time, it's all you. Women, I know you want to knit for the guys in your life, so please change the pronouns as appropriate.

You men knitters have it easier in terms of getting your knits to fit. For one thing, you do not have to ever worry about inserting bust darts. (Big plus right there, as far as this busty gal is concerned.) You generally do not wear your clothing with negative ease, so again, you don't have to do things like waist shaping and tummy darts and all that.

However, for men-who-knit and those who knit-for-men, there are four things to watch for in terms of fit: overall ease, hem length, sleeve length, and shoulder width.

Ease: The more clothing you like to wear underneath, the more ease you will need, so ease preferences can vary from summer to winter. Guys, go into your closet and measure several of your favorite sweaters to get an idea of how much ease you prefer.

Hem and sleeve length: These are rather individual choices. My husband, who has extremely long arms, likes his sweater cuffs extra-long—to the base of his thumb, actually. So again, measure yourself, measure what's in your closet, and knit accordingly.

Shoulder width: If the sweater's shoulder width (across the back of the shoulders) is not wide enough, you will have trouble moving your arms comfortably. Again, get out that measuring tape and go explore your closet.

Everyone had a lot of fun with this Gallery; I hope you enjoy it, too!

—Sandi

View the Brick Pullover Gallery

List of all past Gallery pages

Stay tuned: We'll be announcing the winners of the Knitting Daily Poetry Contest later this week! Hundreds of entries left our judges fighting for their favorites; we finally have the results!

We love to hear what you think! Really. Would I lie to you?

Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily.

What's on Sandi's needles? With a couple of projects marinating in the Naughty Corner, I went back to knitting socks. When all else fails, knit socks.

The Eunny Galleries (AKA The IK Editor Becomes A Gallery Gal)

KD Sandi — Thu, 01 May 2008 23:00:00 GMT

Today we're doing something that I don't think any knitting magazine has ever done before: The editor of Interweave Knits, Eunny Jang, is trying on some of the garments from the Summer 2008 issue of her own magazine, so we can show you what they look like on HER.

Eunny, trying on the Drawstring Raglan

And thus a new Gallery Gal is born...

This time Eunny herself will be providing the commentary on how she would modify the garments to fit her shape and size. (Eunny also asked me to chime in with any additional comments I might have. We'll see...)

Let's start off with some of Eunny's thoughts about the garments in the Summer issue and how she herself might wear them:

The Editor Galleries: Notes from Eunny Jang

I’ve got a confession to make: I feel most comfortable in jeans and a tee-shirt, and the vast majority of my clothes are in solid, somber hues. While I love to knit and admire items full of color or texture, for my day-to-day clothing, I tend to fall back on the easy, the comfortable, the unremarkable. This issue’s knits, however, got me out of the box: Figuring out how richer pieces can fit into my lazy-girl wardrobe can be tricky, but is rewarding.

As usual for the galleries, I’ll guide you on what modifications I’d make to suit me. Not a single knitter in the world is any one “standard” size, and I’m no exception—I’m short (about 5'2" on a good day), not a waif, and have a thick upper body for my height. I’m also very long-waisted (even though I’m short, I tend to find that I need to lengthen sweaters rather than shorten them), short-legged, busty, and broad-shouldered. To top it off, I’ve got some bad scarring from a long-ago accident and prefer not to go sleeveless or too bare on top, so I’m always thinking about how to layer.

Cheers!
—Eunny Jang
Editor, Interweave Knits magazine

Visit Eunny's Gallery

List of all past Gallery pages

I've been PODCASTED!

Download the Top 5 Winning Patterns! (free)

Sandi here again...and have I got something fun for you! This week, Kathy and Steve Elkins of WEBS America's Yarn Store invited me to be a guest on their podcast, Ready Set Knit! Come join us as we chat about the Readers' Choice Award winners, what it's like to be a knitting blogger and make mistakes in public, and lots of other fun knitting stuff! Starting tomorrow morning (May 3), you can download the podcast from the WEBS website, or you can look for it on iTunes.

What's a podcast? It's a little radio show you can listen to on your computer or download to your MP3 player. Grab a cup of tea and your knitting and listen while you get a few rows done!

Spectrum Scarf (free)

This Week's Featured Free Pattern!

Download the Spectrum Scarf, featured in the Yarn Spotlight section of the Summer 2008 issue of Interweave Knits. Take four skeins, each a different color, of a soft laceweight baby alpaca yarn. Knit with four strands of the same color held together and a large needle, this is the easiest lace scarf you will every make, due to the simple, no-brain-drain lace pattern. ("Great TV knitting!" says Eunny.) The color changes are clever: changing the number of strands of each color you hold together as you knit, in a gradually changing spectrum from light to dark.

We love to hear what you think! Really. Would I lie to you?

Sandi Wiseheart is the editor of Knitting Daily.

What's on Sandi's needles? This week has been the Week of Knitting Weirdness here in Chez Sandita. I had to send one of my projects to the Naughty Corner (hoodie for Hubby) due to a disagreement about row gauge and sleeve length. The dog, who has never liked yarn before, chewed on a second project, destroying it partly. I broke a sock needle. (I think I'll do some spinning this weekend.