Test knit for Taiga Hillard

How CUTE are those puff sleeves, huh?! And I love that the neckline is shaped with a few short rows.

I initially tried using DK weight yarn for this. I’ve done this before with other patterns by Taiga Hillard and found I could get away with it. But in this case, it was turning out much too big. So I started over with sock yarn and smaller needles.

I used the Chinese Waitress method for both cast on and bind off. It was particularly nice around the sleeve cuffs because it’s so stretchy.

I always work garter buttonbands with a slipped stitch on RS rows to prevent rippling. It’s not the edge stitch, though, it’s the second st from each edge. (I’ve done this so many times now, I do it automatically without even thinking about it anymore.)

I worked the raglan increases with lifted increases instead of kfb’s. With experience, I’ve learned I can make these look much cleaner than other increase methods.

The yoke wasn’t long enough when it came time to divide body/sleeves, so I work another RS with the increases followed by 5 plain rows of stockinette (and garter borders). This got me to 4” as measured down center-back. Because I had extra sts, though, I only cast on 4 sts at the underarm instead of 6. This got me back to the correct number of sts for the body….

Shortly after dividing sleeves/ body, I tried the piece on my baby-sized mannequin and found the body seemed a bit too tight. So I tried to salvage the situation with several sets of increases at the side ‘seams’, spaced 8 rows apart. It worked well.

Final thought… The ruching at the top of the sleeves puts quite a bit of strain on the last row of the neckband. I’m tempted to try reinforcing the yarn there by working a crochet-chain on the wrong side to reinforce the stability there. Or maybe just use a tapestry needle to sew in some extra yarn on the wrong side.