Bellissima Jumper MAL – The Cast On

Are you ready poppets! Its time to cast on and make a start on our Bellissima Jumber MAL.

Integral Neckline

Cast Off Neckline

Last week week discussed our gauge swatches, cast on methods and some useful stockinette and garter stitches tutorials, if you missed it can you recap here.

This fortnight we will make progress on the front and back panels and choose which neckline to make.

The Back and Front panels are both alike and worked the same, you will be instructed to cast on X amount of stitches accordingly to the size you want.

First is a small section of garter stitch (knit every row), then you will work the stockinette stitch (Knit 1 row, Purl 1 Row) until complete.

Important to know – Decreasing

You will be instructed to:
Cont in St-St: dec 1 st each end of next and every 10th row until work measures XX

This had me scratching my head a little (remember a newbie here) Do I just do a regular decrease? a K2tog? where do I do the decrease?

So off I went in search of answers.. .. .. .. ..

So here is what I learnt, when making a garment and you are instructed to decrease on both ends it normally mean you are tapering the shape to fit the contours of the body. I also learnt that the 2 main decrease stitches (K2tog & SSK) are right and left leaning stitches. Also its important to note that your deceases will always fall on Knit row and never a Purl row.

So when you come to your decrease rows, what you actually have to do is:
K1, ssk, K to last 3, K2tog, K last

See how the shape is taking place.

Here is a great video that explains it all.

Neckline
This pattern has been designed with two necklines, A simple cast on, cast off technique and an integral neckline.
Before you decide what neckline to use, take a moment to read through the instructions.

For the Cast off neck line you will need a stitch holder to hold unused stitches while you decrease and shape one side. You will then rejoin and repeat the decrease and shaping on the other side

For the Integral neckline (my choice) you will do a series of Wrap and Turns (W&T) which is also known as short rows.

Its sounds more complicated than it is, the admin team and I have made a start so if you have any questions ask away in the Pippin Knit Club.

Helpful Techniques
Here are a couple of helpful techniques if you do make a boo boo and need to fix without losing all your hard work.

Notebook
I’m a little OCD and I want my back panel to match my front panel exactly. But when you are instructed to work until its measure XX, I want m back panel to have the exact same amount of rows. So yes poppets I made notes and counted ever single row I did on the front panel, marking where my decrease row where.

The Lifeline is exactly what it says, every knitter new or old should know this technique.

How to fix a dropped stitch, I actually only found this one out last night – Knitting while helping with homework while watching AGT is not a good mix.. Oh and there was a spider involved …