I made a number of changes to this pattern to suit my pear shape, consequently making it much harder to knit and involving quite a few math sessions. I knew the wide v-neck would be falling off my shoulders so I narrowed the neckline a lot and raised the start of the v-neckline. The pattern band sequence was juggled so that the more prominent, noticeable bands were across my shoulders making them appear wider. I also changed the raglan shaping so that it was narrower on the body, especially at the underarm, and wider on the sleeve. Although I’m not sure I would do it again, I deepened the armhole by 16 rows to make it easier to wear over other clothes.

I really had to stretch the sleeve length when blocking so if you have long arms you might want to add a band of pattern to the lower sleeve length.

Juggling the pattern bands to allow the big flowers across my shoulders also made it so that I had to keep an eye on how this pattern met at the raglan shaping. This wouldn’t have been necessary if this pattern had been lower on my body, below the raglan shaping.

I lengthened the body by 58 rows and added patch pockets. The pockets were knitted together in a tube with steeking, cut apart and then the garter ribbing was added and the pocket was mattress-stitched to the body. When planning the pockets you have to make sure that the Fairisle pattern matches the sweater underneath. The bottom row of the pocket was Kitchener stitched to the sweater.

The raglan seams had some holes along the shaping so I mattress stitched the seam to close the gaps.

Once the raglan shaping was finished I decided to add short rows to the back neck to raise it up. I added 18 rows but probably would have been better off with less, perhaps 12 or 14 rows. I should have continued the raglan decreases on the short rows as I knit them, but didn’t, so the back neck was still a bit wide. I ran a doubled piece of yarn along the top and bottom of the back neckband and gathered it up a bit. After steaming you couldn’t really tell it was there.

I made the garter stitch banding 13 rows wide instead of 11 rows. I thought that suited the larger size better and it also made more room for the vintage buttons which were a little bigger than called for. I’ve been waiting 20 years for a project to use those buttons on. Love them so much! Happy buttons on a happy sweater!