We’re delighted to be hosting our very own Rosemont Cardigan Knit-A-Long on the Kelbourne Woolens Blog. The Rosemont Cardigan, by Hannah Fettig, features Terra in Nettle and is a great way to stay warm during the last few months of winter.
Last week we discussed the neck and raglan increases for the Rosemont Cardigan. For some, myself included, figuring out the increases was little tricky. But, with the help of not one, but two informative blog posts from Kate and Hannah, I completed my final raglan increases and my stitch count matches!
Last night when I was finishing up my final increase rows, my roommate asked about the construction of my sweater. I proudly lifted my needles and showed her how the fronts, sleeves and back were all worked at once, to which she replied: “how do you knit the sleeves if it’s all in one piece?” I then described my next step: dividing the sleeves from the body in order to knit each sleeve separately and the body in one piece.
Below is my finished yoke, waiting patiently for the division.
Alright, now let’s divide, shall we?
Remember those stitch markers we placed in the beginning of our knitting? As we discussed before, those markers represent the different sections of our Rosemont Cardigan and are also used to identify the separate sections when dividing our sleeves and body.
You will start by knitting the front stitches of your cardigan as specified by the pattern to the first marker. Remove this marker and place the sleeve stitches (the stitches in-between the first and second markers) on a holder or waste yarn, then remove the second marker.
I prefer waste yarn when holding stitches – that way I can try on my cardigan as I go along without my stitches being cramped on stitch holders, but how you chose to hold the sleeve stitches is entirely up to you.
Next, you’ll need to cast on stitches to create the underarm. If you’re familiar with sweaters knit from the bottom up, these cast-on stitches replicate the initial bind off (usually about an inch or so on each side) of a sleeve cap and underam shaping of the body. Using a backwards loop cast on, you’re creating a defined underarm seam, which we will use later when attaching the sleeves.
Using a backwards loop cast on, cast-on the number of stitches as specified in the pattern.
After your underarm stitches have been added you can move on to the remainder of your sweater; knit across the back stitches, slide the left sleeve stitches to waste yarn or a holder, cast-on your left underarm stitches and then knit the left front stitches.
And, viola! My sleeves are divided, the underarm stitches are cast-on and the body of my cardigan is joined and ready to be worked until my desired length. You will still be working the neck increases on the right and left fronts, too, so don’t forget about those increases when working your body.
To track your sweater progress, we made a little doodle as a free download!
So go ahead and color along your progress and don’t forget to show us with the #RosemontKAL tag on Instagram and Facebook so we can see your cardigans start to take shape!
In a few days, we’ll discuss some possible modifications you can make to the sweater body for an even-more-customized fit and shape! See you then!
– Leah