Cherry Pie

Last night I had a dream that Zena and I were both knitting the same cardigan. I walked into a room to find Zena's cardigan blocking out on the bed, almost finished. It was completely assembled except that the right front was not quite finished being knitted (impossible I know, but it was a dream, okay!). In the dream the cardigan had long sleeves, a small cable pattern all over it and this really interesting flared peplum done in short rows. It was more like a structured jacket than a cardigan I would have to say and I think it was pale blue. In the dream I was no where near this finished and there was a definite sense of panic. Weird!

In real life, we are both still plugging away at our Cherries, at slightly different paces, stopping to work on other projects from time to time, until the other person (me) has a chance to catch up a bit!

After my comment last time about the possibly small sleeves, Zena had this to say (earlier in the week)....

Ooh I see what you mean about the sleeves! I just cast on for the first one, only knitted two rows of the rib and I can see already that its not going to fit! The sleeves are cast on 57 stitches, rib for an inch and then do a bunch of increases to get 76 stitches. I just wrapped the back of my cardi around my upper arm and I need 75 stitches to get the rib sitting comfortably- which is pretty much exactly what I'll have after the ribbing and increases in the pattern, except that 57 stitches will definitely not fit. Therefore I think I'm going to make the call to cast on 75 stitches, rib away for an inch and then increase 1 stitch to get an even number and continue as per the sleeve cap in the pattern. It means my sleeves won't be puffy but hey I never expected them to be! At least this way it should fit AND I won't have to mess around with the sleeve cap- this is my first proper adult fitted sleeves so would like to just follow the pattern this time!

Can you see why she is my best friend! She is so clever. I still have not blocked my first sleeve to see how my solution to the problem turned out. I think I'm avoiding it, and I have a strong suspicion that I will just end up doing what Zena has done. Instead I went straight on to the left front and worked on something I knew would turn out okay. My usual denial technique!

Here's the left front (button band and all!) beside the back, after blocking,


and a bit of an artistic shot showing off the pretty stitch pattern. So much better without the flash!

I am now happily working away on the right front, still avoiding the issue of the sleeves!

Zena on the other hand has tackled it head on. A few days after making her hypothesis on the sleeves she had put it into practise. She sent me this....

Here are some progress photo's of my cherry- its growing!

I decided to go with the modified sleeves as we discussed earlier - I cast on 75 stitches for the 36" size, ribbed for an inch and then increased one stitch to give 76 stitches as called for in the pattern after the increase row. This meant I could just follow the pattern for the sleeve cap. It means the sleeve isn't puffy at all but it does fit and I think it looks fine. It was fun trying to fit the sleeve cap into place- I've never done a proper adult one before but it wasn't as scary as I expected.

Showing off her methodical approach to fitting the sleeve cap here,


and here with a sleeve that fits.


Note the yarn in the back pocket. Nice bum Zenes!

Ever the perfectionist, Zena has some concerns about the placement of birdies along the front openings.

I'm still really happy with the way this is progressing although I'm not 100% sure about the birdie placement in some areas- my guess is that it was designed for a smaller size (Miss Bell looks to be a bit slimmer than a 36") and the scaling up has thrown things out a bit. I won't really know if its a problem for me until its all finished, which feels a bit risky but hey that is knitting- if I wanted certainty I'd be buying a cardi in the shops not knitting it myself!

Looking at my photo above, I think the birdies along the front opening look fine once the button band is in place, and I hope for Zena's sake that she thinks so too. Otherwise I fear a lot of frogging. Yikes!

Just a little history on Zena and I. We met on the second day of University after moving into on campus accommodation and finding that we were next door to each other. Zena was studying Environmental Engineering and I was studying Materials Engineering. Being the only two female engineers in the place they must have figured that we would have something in common and that we would get along. They were right! That was fifteen years ago!

About five years ago (a little less) Zena and I continued our history of independently doing the same thing when we both decided (without any discussions between the two of us, hard to believe I know) that we wanted to learn how to knit. I had seen a blanket pattern in the "Better Homes and Gardens" magazine that I thought would look good on our new lounge in our new little house. I was newly married and must have been nesting. Zena found a fluffy white scarf that was a must have but didn't want to pay the $90 asking for something that was in her mind so simple.

Typical for the two of us, I went out and bought a book, and asked my Nanny to teach me how to knit, while Zena worked it out all by herself from her memories of knitting as a child. Zena still wears that scarf today (fluffy white angora in garter stitch with lots of tassels, just gorgeous) and my blanket did indeed look good on our new lounge. The rest as they say is history!