Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Summer Square boatneck raglan

This is a summery extra-short sleeve raglan. The directions are for a medium size and worsted weight yarn (with a gauge of 4 sts per inch) and size 7 needles. Size 5 needles are used for the sleeve finishing. I used 7 skeins of shine worsted yarn (525 yds). Most people would need 8 skeins.

It can be made larger/smaller by either doing more/fewer increase rows in the raglan shaping section or casting on more/fewer sts. (If casting on more/fewer sts, try to leave the neckband ratio similar. In this pattern, there are 33 sts for the front/back panel and 11 sts for each sleeve -- a ratio of 3 to 1. So, one could decrease to 27 and 9 -- again a ratio of 3 to 1 and again both odd numbers. One could also increase to 39 and 13.)

It's not necessary to work the pattern. I added it because I thought I'd get bored doing straight stockinette for the rest of the pullover. A blog entry on the pattern is here. It includes a variation of the chart made before I realized that charts are read from the bottom right corner up and across. It also includes a discussion on the best way to join yarn for a slippery cotton blend.

Neckband:
CO 92. Join.
Work *p1, k1* around for 6 rounds, starting w the p1.
*p1, k11, p1, k33* twice
p92

Upper Body:
R1: *P1, k1, m1, knit to 1 st before next purl, m1, k1* four times.
R2: Knit the knit sts and the m1's, purl the 4 purl sts

Alternate these rnds to 34 increase rnds total and 228 sts total. Then do just R2 until 45 total rnds for me (51 for most people) not including the ribbing – or until the sweater lies 1” below the underarm. Then: p1, *k3, p3* around, k3, p2 (R1 of both the sleeve and garment pattern).

Lower Body:
*K1, put the next 47 sts on a spare circ, co9, k67* twice (152 sts total). This is R2 of garment and garment underarm patts. (The 47 sts to be put aside are the sleeve sts.)

The pattern chart doesn't show up well here. Another version is here. Click on the chart to see a close-up. A picture of the sweater is at that link and as the second sweater in the link here.

Continue w R3 of garment and garment underarm patts. (Every even rnd is knit around.)

After the patt rnds, continue shaping by decreasing 4 sts every 10th row above the waist and increasing every 5th row below to end with 152 sts at desired length.

Lower Garment Ribbing:
set-up round: *(k1, p1) twice, k1, p2tog, (k1, p1) twice* around, ending either w (k1, p1) or (k1, p2tog)
*k1, p1* around for 14 rnds.
Bind off.

Sleeves:
Use a needle 1 or 2 sizes smaller than for the rest of the garment. Starting with the middle stitch, knit 4 sts from the underarm cast-on sts, knit the last cast-on st together with the nearest sleeve st, knit to the last of the sleeve sts, knit that together w the nearest cast on stitch, and then knit 3 sts to reach the middle again. (54 sts) (This is R2 of the sleeve pattern.) Continue with R3 of the sleeve patt. (Every even rnd is knit around.)

Bind off.