I purchased the yarn during a summer sale in 2017. Because it came bagged together, I assumed it was all the same dye lot; it was not. The bundle contained six skeins of one lot and two skeins of another.

By sheer coincidence, all of the skeins I grabbed for the back were the same color. It wasn’t until I was partway through the first front that I discovered the issue. I ripped back and decided to alternate skeins on the fronts and sleeves.

I ended up buying a mystery skein from WEBS (in what turned out to be a third dye lot), and then another skein in one of the dye lots I was already using from Dawnie, for a total of 10 skeins.

Of course, when all was said and done, I needed less than one-tenth of the tenth skein, leaving almost a whole skein for a matching hat.

Buttons are from JoAnn, because there weren’t enough of the pretty, one-of-a-kind glass ones I wanted at my local fabric/knitting store Downtown Knits.

Fit Choices

• Hourglass average fit
• Medium-hip length
• Full-length tapered sleeves
• Average width v-neck, 3” below armhole

A Note on Stitch Patterns and Seams
CustomFit provides instructions for how to work any stitch patterns that are called for in the instructions, but it does not account for a selvage stitch or for the number of stitches needed for a stitch pattern to continue seamlessly once the garment is seamed. I prefer to keep the first and last stitch in stockinette to make seaming easier, and for my edgings to appear seamless, which means altering all of my cast on numbers. In this instance, because my edgings were all 2x2 ribbing, I opted to increase all cast ons by 2 stitches.

Things I Did

• Cast ons: Long-tail cast on throughout
• Bind offs: Chain bind off for the sleeves and for the front and back neckline edges that would be picked up. Lace/Russian/P2tog bind of for the finished neckline edging. Three-needle bind off for the shoulders.
• Short-row shoulder shaping referencing TECHknitter’s and Knitty’s instructions.
• One-row buttonholes referencing Ysolda’s instructions.
• Both bands are faced with grosgrain ribbon hand-stitched in place. Buttonholes in the ribbon facing were made with a sewing machine.

Things I Would Do Differently

• Check dye lots first. Scrambling to buy yarn mid-project is unnecessarily frustrating and stressful. Don’t do it, kids.

• Triple-check both body measurements and gauge. A combination of slightly generous measurements and superwash yarn resulted in a body that’s a little too long (closer to low hip than mid-hip) and sleeves that are a lot too long. I wear the sleeves cuffed, which looks fine but isn’t ideal. Next time I’ll hang the swatch to dry with a couple of clothespins clipped to the bottom, instead of laying it flat.

• Stick to close fit. I “sized up” to average fit (i.e. more ease) because I plan to wear this sweater over long-sleeve t-shirts and dress shirts. I needn’t have bothered; there’s more than enough ease. In fact, I’d prefer to slimmer silhouette. The shoulders could probably stand to come in a smidge, too—after making a couple of different tops (knit and sewn), I’m thinking I have slightly narrow shoulders for my size.