Simple and Black

Before I got caught up in sewing my daughters' dresses for a family wedding, I had cast-on for a black cardigan. I needed one for routine use, and considering how black (and sparkly black at that ) can be a difficult color, I wanted a plain sweater. And I wanted to knit contiguous sleeves. And I was feeling too lazy to figure out the details on my own. So I searched and found a free, contiguous pullover pattern and chose to knit it as a cardigan.

This is how far I came, before the wedding sewing put the inevitable pause in my knitting:

 As you can see, I have divided for sleeves and from now onwards, it is just rows of simple stockinette stitch, with a little bit of waist shaping. I hope to resume work on it in a couple of days. It is going to be an loosely-fitting, cozy sweater. For this season or next.

Around The House Cardigan

Someone gave me some old yarn recycled from an old sweater, a while back. Since it was a color most often by me in sweaters, I used it to knit a cardigan for myself to wear around the house. The yarn is somewhere between sports and DK weight. After figuring out the needle size and gauge, I knit a top-down cardigan using contiguous method for shoulders and set-in sleeves.I incorporated a cable for the saddle shoulder.

 Even though I was a bit uncertain about the fit, seeing how I was winging the whole process, it turned out fabulously well, at the first go. Even though it is my third contiguous project, I still get thrilled by how this method makes wonderfully seamless sweaters.  

I used cable charts from this pattern. In the end, the yarn ran a bit short so I ended up with a slightly cropped cardigan and three-quarter sleeves.

 

Red Coat

 

 The contiguous experiment went very well and I now have a quite nice-looking finished garment. I made this for my six year old, with room to grow. The design is my own, though I used the contiguous method by SusieM for top down set-in sleeves. The yarn is our local acrylic worsted weight on 4 mm needles.

 My daughter is very happy with the coat and wants a hat to match, so I guess that is going to be my next project. I have to say I love all these buttons, make me think of a ladybird.

 

Contiguous Adventure

For my next project, I decided to try a new technique....contiguous method for doing top-down set-in sleeves and shoulder seams by SusieM (ravelry group here.). It did seem a bit daunting initially but is actually a quite simple concept. You start at the neckline, do the shoulder shaping and the add stitches for sleeves and do the set in sleeves at the same time as the front and back of the garment.There are a lot of things going on at once but the end result is  quite pretty and seamless.

My first attempt went very well, I think. I had a flash of inspiration and knit the sleeves first. Now that I am past all that shaping, all I have to knit is the rest of the body on this red coat for my older daughter. Nothing  challenging, just acres of plain stockinette stitch.