I finished a sweater (top?) for me!

Project: Blue Yonder Lambton

Pattern: Lambton Top

Designer: Theressa Silver

Available: in  Jane Austen Knits 2011  or $5.50 in the IP Store (for the single pattern)

Yarn: Knit Picks Shadow Tonal in Blue Yonder

This pattern was written for color-matched laceweight and fingering yarn. I opted to use Shadow Tonal — single-stranded for the laceweight ruching, and double-stranded for the fingering portions.  This worked out really well, and made it extra easy to do the ruching increases. The row before the increases is double-stranded, so for the increase row I knit one stitch into each individual loop to double the stitch count.

I made substantial modifications in two areas.  The first is the neckline.  I knew when I began knitting that many people felt the neckline as-written was too big, especially in the larger sizes. I decided to make it as written anyway, knowing it would be relatively easy to go back and add extra rows of ruching at the neck by picking up stitches from the cast-on edge and working upwards with decreases at the corners.  Here’s a WIP picture of the neckline as written:

When the garment was finished, the neckline was indeed to broad for my liking.  The puffed sleeves pulled the shoulders off, and the corners of the square neckline showed my bra WAY too much.  I followed my plan, and did two extra batches of ruching at the top — it looks weird when flat, but fits me well.

I also modded the bottom hem — instead of garter stitch, I used this pretty little lace edging. I also did a seven-stitch repeat of the slipped stitches in order to make everything work.