St.Nicklaus & Artist's Sweater

St. Nicklaus must have made an appearance some time on the night of Dec. 5th. The children found this evidence. Of course I did not remember the camera until we had cut their oranges for breakfast.I'm right in the thick of another sweater again, this time for the Artist. With my friends, the calculator and the tape measure, I began by figuring out how to adapt the adult size pattern to my daughter. It helped that the pattern calls for a chunky size yarn and I am using a worsted weight yarn. The way the gauge swatches worked out, I'm using the third set of numbers in the pattern for stitches and the tape measure for verifying the correct number of rows.
Last night the Artist tried on the finished garment sans sleeves. It looked pretty good. I did decide to take out the finishing on the neck and make it again with ten fewer stitches picked up.

After she went to bed I began sewing up the seam on the first sleeve. Then I pinned and basted it to the garment to check the fit. I am still uncertain whether I'll have to remake the sleeve caps. This is the place where my reducing the pattern did not seem to work with the number of rows I'd take to properly reduce the number of stitches. Half way through the cap I began reducing with sssk's and k3together's to keep it from becoming too large. Now I'm having my doubts as to whether that was the right thing to do.

Once the basted sleeve was in place I got out a spray bottle and did a little blocking on the lace edging all around the hems and neck. The layers facing the carpet are still a little damp this morning, so maybe I'll have her try on the one-sleeve garment after lunch. Then I should be able to judge for certain whether I need to remake the sleeve caps.

One of the first things that attracted me to this pattern was the lace edging at the hems and neckline. Here is a close up. I'm so glad I swatched the lace pattern first. I discovered my product looked nothing like the photo. Then I searched on line for help and found out that I've been doing yarn-overs incorrectly all this time. Strike heel of hand to forehead, feel stupid, repeat. And I've been happy with the lace items I've made the wrong way. Imagine how much I'd enjoy them if they were done properly. At least I have expanded my knowledge base now and I can make higher quality things in the future.