Letters
Bang Out a Hadley Knitalong: The Sleevening
Dear Ann,
As I look around in the Lounge and on Instagram, I can feel my lead slipping away from me. I’m like the hare (the hare who cheated with a fast head start) looking over his shoulder at a mob of hell-bent tortoises. They are getting closer and closer. When they catch me, I’m going to try to make friends and pretend I was never gloating over my lead at all.
Hi! Welcome! Let’s finish this sweater together! Let’s collaborate!
The reason everybody is catching up is simple: it’s just not that hard to knit a sweater, if you keep knitting on the sweater. Hadley is a very straightforward knit. You take the pattern and the yarn, add lashings of conference calls and/or semi-trashy TV bingeing (Versailles on Netflix certainly qualifies–my word, what didn’t Louis XIV and his brother get up to?), and before you know it you are starting the second sleeve.
The Perilous Shoals of Sleif
Note: I said starting the second sleeve. There is something troublesome about second sleeves. It’s similar to Second Sock Syndrome, but somehow more soul-crushing, because that first sock is a complete whole, an achievement unto itself. You could, if you wanted to, wear a First Sock in some kind of purposefully mismatched way, perhaps by pairing it with other First Socks in an enthusiastic collection of First Socks.
But, in contrast to a lonely but useful sock, a sweater that bogs down on the second sleeve is cause for great sadness. I call it sleeve grief, which Kiki of Luscious Gracious elides to the far more amusing term “slief.” Others have called this situation Sleeve Island. After weeks (or days that seem like weeks) on the vast, monotonous seas of the body of the sweater, you scramble onto Sleeve Island, where you experience the joy of exploring that first sleeve. Then you start the second sleeve, and all too quickly you get the suffocating feeling that you may never get off Sleeve Island. So many sweaters have perished on those rocks.
The solution, as ever, is: keep knitting. The sleeves on Hadley are finite. They go quickly. An hour or so of colorwork. A reasonable amount of stockinette, with increases, after that. Keep at it. Don’t give in to negative self-talk. You’re not on Alcatraz. There’s a way off this island, and it’s called: keep knitting.
The Sleeve Chart
Has anybody had any difficulty with Hadley’s sleeve chart? It’s a 12-stitch repeat, but the number of stitches on the sleeve is a multiple of 12 for the first two sizes only. For the other sizes, you have to start and end at a specified spot before and after the repeat, or mid-repeat, if that makes more sense.
For the bust size I’m knitting, 44 3/4, with 53 stitches for the sleeve, I started the pattern 2 stitches before the beginning of the 12-stitch repeat, and ended it 3 stitches after the 12-stitch repeat. What that means is that on the underside of the sleeve, where the round starts and ends, the pattern doesn’t flow seamlessly. There’s a little hiccup that looks like a face:
It kind of sprouts off of the center line.
I didn’t try to start the sleeve increases before the end of the chart, although that would have been fairly straightforward; I didn’t want to bother with more thinking about where to start and end the chart. I did the first increase round right after I was done with the colorwork chart.
I was used to Icelandic sweater patterns, where the cuff pattern repeat is fewer stitches, and the number of stitches on the sleeve are a perfect multiple of the number of stitches in the repeat. If that were the case, the sleeve would look like this, all the way around:
I think I could have done without those 5 extra stitches at the wrist/forearm of the sleeve, and had an easier time starting and stopping the stitch pattern. But I followed the chart for my size, and here I am, alive and well.
The moral of the story: live and learn. Stay flexible, follow the instructions, even if they seem a bit awkward, and it will turn out ok. Or, reject the pattern instructions, cast on an exact multiple of the 12-stitch repeat, and do a couple more increase rounds afterwards to get the sleeve up to the correct size. You’re the boss; it’s your choice.
Love,
Kay
Don’t give in to the slief, Kay! Mooooaaaaarrrrr knitting! You can do it!
I’m working on a different yoked sweater (a Riddari cardigan), and I joined the sleeves for the yoke, only to discover that, lo and behold, my sleeves have different numbers of stitches, thus throwing off the stitch count for the yoke. So the sweater languishes while I finish a blanket and try to figure out how to fix the sleeves.
I think the unintended little “face” looks charming, much like some of the faces painted into ivy and acanthus borders in medieval manuscripts!
There is a simple prevention for slief and for Kerry’s problem. It’s called two sleeves on two circulars. No more SSS (second sleeve syndrome) and two beautifully identical sleeves, ready to attach to the body.
You’ll never go back to the old way!
I always forget I’m the boss.
I’m not going to lie. I am relieved that I am not the only person that saw a flock with the pattern on the sleeves. As you know for my whining on several different platforms it was making me crazy. The differences you got a cute little face with your pattern and I got a blank spot. So I’m still not sure what I didn’t do right. However, my little mine doesn’t do random well so I tried everything and went to a size that was neatly divisible
Well, that comment posted before I could review it and or finish it. Now it won’t let me edit . At any rate, I did frog everything and start over in a size divisible by 12. I increased according to pattern, and then kept going, and by the time the sleeve was over, I was two stitches shy of the required amount. I’m okay with that as I can fix that in the decreases. While I am okay with my decision and I’m happy with this symmetry of the sleeve , I do wish that I could figure out what I did wrong in the size called for . I tried it a few different ways and could not figure it out and that is maddening. However, the dreams (nightmares) about sleeves did fade last night as I had already finished My first sleeve in the other size. I already have a cuff going in my second sleeve so I’m not too worried about the island but thanks for the warning!
The Sleevening – sounds like an epic Nordic Noir
To stay out of Slief Slough … knit the sleeve(s) first, TAAT, if possible. (The first six inches of a sleeve is also an excellent swatch!)
I’ve just knit a little bit of a sleeve as a swatch, worked a treat! Got gauge as well which was great. I’m going to use Maniatoto Wools DK, so lofty and airy (will make for a nice, snuggly knit).
My sweater is looking so good!
Kay, I love it: “an enthusiastic collection of First Socks”.
You may have started a whole new movement, the unashamedly donning of the missed matched pair of hand knit socks! It could be the wild pairing of two totally different colorways. It could be similar colorways, so that the socks match, but not really. Oh, and FSK (First Sock Knitters) all over could swap their unused leftover skeins so that they could knit more First Socks to add to their collection! Even diehard two at a time, toe up sock knitters could pair up and exchange one sock to achieve a mismatched pair for each knitter. Such fun! Such possibility! We could knit stocking caps to further the awareness of only knitting First Socks. Who’s in?
This sounds so hygge!
Me! I’m terrified of SSS, and socks in general but love the idea of knitting them. But alas, my mind creeps back to the fingerless mitt lanquishing in my knit WIP bag, waiting forever waiting for her mate to arrive….
“Some enchanted sleevening, you may knit a sweater?”
This lovely earworm wins the internets for me today.
Thank you. 🙂
Yes, indeed, I am the boss of my own knitting. 🙂 Thank you for the reminder.
is this what the designer intended? I think a note to that effect would save people a lot of time, thinking that they must have done something wrong.
Of course, even if it was intended, we do get to chose what we create with our knitting. 🙂
“Face up to it”….such a conversation element!
I nearly always START with the sleeves of a sweater the work them 2-at-a-time. The project is still new enough to not be boring and I get the benefit of a bigger gauge swatch. No sweater island for me.
“The solution, as ever, is: keep knitting.” you’re soaring tp Zimmermann heights, Kaye! I think I’m going to work that quote into my next Pussyhat.
This was so helpful, Kay. I was stymied by the sleeve chart for my size (42) and started getting myself in a tizzy. Thank you for talking me down off the ledge!
Kay, is that a 9 in or 12 in Circe you are using for your sleeve?