Mother’s Helena: What I Did

This is Clara's mother's Helena. I made Helena for Clara and knew it would please both Clara, and her mother if I made a matching sweater for mom. See Clara's Helena and Clara's and Mom's together below.

Step-by-step, here's how I made a Mom's Helena...

1. I babysit once a week, so on one of my babysitting days I found one of my daughter in law’s sweaters, measured the bust, arm length, sleeve depth and body length. My dil had a sweater with ¾ sleeves and a bit of swing so I was able to use those measurements. If you only have a traditional sweater to measure, the bust is the important measurement. You can guesstimate the others.

2. Generated a pattern for a top down v-neck cardigan with Sweater Wizard, using the measurements from dil’s own sweater. Size 7 needle; Cascade 220. Any top down v neck cardigan pattern would do.

3. Modified the sleeve increases so that the last four increases were spaced every four rows followed by 1 ½ inches without increases.

4. Modified my basic pattern to make it a Helena as follows:

Worked in stockinette 3 rows after separating for the sleeves.
Using size 5 (2 sizes down) needles worked raised band (k2 rows, p1 row, k2 row)
Back to size 7 needles
Increased to 200 stitches from 168 for bodice swing immediately below raised band
Worked lace pattern for 8 repeats
Switched to size 5 needles and worked 6 rows, then eyelet row, then four rows and bind off

5. Sleeves: I needed to go up a needle size to size 8 because I knit tighter in the round

6. Knitted on the 7 row garter stitch edging pretty much as directed in Helena directions. I used one button right below where I had finished the neck shaping. I put the button hole in the middle row of the edging, the 4th row.

The sweater was easy to knit and looks great. I’m pretty pleased with myself right now!

In Time for Christmas! Whew!

The Mother Daughter Helena's are done! I hope mother and daughter will model their new sweaters for the camera Christmas morning.

Mom' sweater is in Cascade 220 in a slightly muted pink, Clara's is in Berroco Comfort DK in bright pink. Close enough to satisfy Miss Clara, I think!

Mother Daughter Helenas

Here is Clara's Helena. I love the picot hem. I'd never seen it before but now I see it everywhere. It is so easy and so pretty! See my December 5th post for pictures before turning the hem under.

And here's Mom's! I have one sleeve, the hem and the edging to do. Hopefully I'll have pictures of that one soon. I started with a Sweater Wizard v-neck cardigan and modified it to be akin to the girl's Helena. I'll post the details when I get it done and know it works! Right now I best get knitting!

February Lady Sweater Hints

The February Lady Sweater is done and looks terrific on my daughter. I complained about this pattern as I was working on it but I stuck to the pattern, deviated not a wit, and the end result is just what I wanted.

That said, here are some hints for success:

· Everyone says the sweater runs big, or stretches. Pay attention to gauge and choose the finished bust size, not your ready-to-wear size. I made a small for a 41 inch finished bust.

· Mark the front of the sweater after the first row or two so you make sure to get the raglan increases on the right side – every time! With garter stitch it would be easy to get confused.

· Raglan increases: This is the one change I would make to the pattern. The pattern has you make raglan increases every knit row a prescribed number of times and then stop the increases and finish the yoke. But many knitters complain that the pattern results in folds in the underarm. I agree, although they looked better in the end than I feared. So: next time I am going to taper off my increases rather than end them abruptly. I’ll do the last three increases every other knit row rather than every knit row.

I did the M1 front and back increases as suggested. They give a nice look. If you aren’t sure what they are, check out the video at http://www.knittinghelp.com/videos/increases. BTW – I love all the videos at knittinghelp.com. I frequently turn to them when I become confused about something I think I should know or used to know and can’t remember.

· Eyelet increases: The pattern calls for a row of eyelet increases in the first knit row after the last raglan increase. I ended up with 12 rows in the yoke below my eyelet increases. I thought that was too much, just for looks. If I were to do it again I’d do the eyelet increases 3 rows up from the last garter stitch row.

Then the question is: to do eyelet increases or not. I thought they looked silly. My daughter thought they were a nice design element. Some knitters try to do an invisible increase but really, right across the yoke, any increase is going to be visible. I thought about doing invisible (knit front and back) increases in the last garter stitch row, right above the beginning of the lace, and think that would work.

· Buttonholes: I ended up with four. Three looks better. I had to do four because I made my second one too soon and there would have been too much yoke below the last buttonhole had I only done three. So don’t make your second buttonhole too soon.

And pay attention to which side you make your buttonhole on. It may not matter to you, but traditionally a woman’s buttonhole goes on the wearer’s right side. If you want it that way, make sure that’s the side you put it on. I used the buttonhole directions referenced in the pattern. It’s ok but I wasn’t thrilled. If anyone knows a better way or has suggestions I’d love to hear them.

· The rest of the sweater went together easily. I knit the sleeves at the end. Others have suggested doing the sleeves earlier so you don’t have so much sweater to maneuver. I wished I had until I finally realized (duh!) I didn’t have to keep turning the sweater everytime I did a round on the sleeve if I turned the sleeve instead. I’ll probably do the sleeve last again just because I always worry I’m running low on yarn and if I ever really am running low it would be easier to make the sleeves shorter than to make the body shorter.

Oops... I forgot to mention one intentional pattern modification I did make. On the sleeves, I decreased one stitch per lace repeat in the last row of the lace. Garter stitch is wider than the lace stitch and I didn't want the cuffs to bell out quite as much as they do on the pattern. If I were to do it again, I think I'd take them in even more. However, once again, my daughter preferred the slight bell aas written in the pattern.

All in all this is a lovely pattern, a quick knit and I’m going to make it again. Soon!