FO: On The Road Pullover

This one is for my darling husband (also known as He Who Finances the Wool Habit). Like most guys, he wanted a plain, simple, dark pullover. Since I totally bailed on the sport weight, plain black stockinette, cashmere turtleneck I promised him two years ago (he did finally get a commercially-knitted one for Christmas), I decided to put the lovely Beaverslide I got on sale to use and made him this one instead. The knitting of this took less than two weeks and was mostly completed on the way to and from Lake Tahoe--hence the name.

Pattern: My own. Knitted bottom up, in the round to the chest, then flat, with a three-needle bind off at the shoulders. Sleeves were knitted separately, top down, flat for the first two inches to fit into the modified drop shoulder armscye, then joined and knitted in the round to the wrist. One of the things I love about top-down sleeves, especially those knitted in the round, is that it is easy to correct the length once the whole sweater is put together. In this case, once the whole sweater was put together, I decided to add an inch to each cuff. It was simple to take out the bind off and add a few rounds before binding off again. The body of the sweater is plain stockinette, with twisted 1x1 ribbing at the cuffs and collar. The chest and upper back are done in 4x2 ribbing for interest.

The collar was an inspiration. My husband likes rolled necks, but all the sweaters I've done for him have roll necks and I wanted to knit something different. A zip neck got the thumbs up for this one. I've never done one, so I worked it out as I went. Originally, it was going to be just a straight-up collar with a zipper the whole length. But as I knitted it, that seemed too floppy, so I decided to try turning the collar in on itself to make a double-thick, stand up collar.

I had to special order the zipper once the knitting was done and I could get an exact length (thanks again, Zipperstop!). I used a jeans zipper with metal teeth because I wanted something substantial to complement the rustic yarn and manly style. I'm very happy with the end result. For the record, I pinned the zipper so that the top end was halfway up the collar, sewed it in place by hand, then rolled the collar over and sewed it down. It took a few tried to get it pinned in right, but once that was done, the sewing was straightforward.

Size: 46". My husband has a 43" chest, so I thought this would give him plenty of ease, but I neglected to factor in his really buff shoulders, which take up a lot more room than I figured. So this is a more fitted sweater than I intended, but I still like the fit. More importantly, he considers it "perfect."

Yarn: Beaverslide merino/mohair in Natural Black. This was labeled 2-ply worsted, but I would call it an aran-bulky weight. My gauge was 16 stitches to 4 inches in stockinette on size 8 needles. This yarn was on clearance because it had an unusual amount of straw in it, even for a rustic yarn. Picking it out was a pain, and even after multiple pickings, I didn't get it all out. I expect we'll be picking it out for years to come. But the yarn is every bit as gorgeous as every other Beaverslide yarn I've tried, and bloomed into a soft, blurry, dense, warm fabric. This is the sort of yarn that gets better and better with age and wear and washing and lasts for years.

Needles: KnitPicks Options cirs, sizes 7 and 8.

Thoughts: Straw aside, I really enjoyed knitting this. Even though the design is simple, the yarn made the knitting a pleasure. I may have to buy some more Beaverslide in another color to make him something else!

Zipper Installation Unzipped

After staring at the Aran Cardigan hanging over a kitchen chair for two weeks (where I deliberately left it to spur myself to some sort of productive action), I finally tackled the zipper installation. It's not my favorite activity, but sometimes only a zipper will do. A few people commented on an earlier post that they have avoided attempting to install a zipper because it seems so hard. I've made two zippered cardigans before this one, both before I learned that installing a zipper is supposed to be hard, so I was never afraid to try it. In all honesty, I can assure you it is not hard in either concept or execution, even with my negligible sewing skills. If I can manage it, you surely can! For those of you who might not have tried it before, I took pictures of the process so I could prove it to you.

If you recall, the zipper I ordered for this sweater turned out to be much too long. So the first order of business was shortening it. Thanks to Sue, I knew that I needed to remove the zipper stops at the top, cut the zipper to the right length, then reattach the stops. The little things at the top are, naturally, the stops:

Alas, after twenty minutes with a tiny screwdriver and a needlenose pliers, I discovered that, in an excess of caution, the manufacturer of this particular zipper not only crimps the stop in place, but also glues them down, to be sure they won't come loose. And I'm sure they would be happy to know that nothing short of a nuclear blast is going to separate one of their zipper stops from the zipper. Not to worry, though. I happened to have a zipper repair kit handy, and there were extra stops in the kit. So I put the zipper in place and decided where to cut:

[This, by the way, is the actual, real color of the sweater, at least on my monitor.]

Unfortunately, as soon as I cut it, the fabric began to fray, so I sealed it with some clear nail polish and then installed the new stops by crimping them over the end of the zipper with the needlenose pliers:

With the zipper shortened to the proper length, I began pinning it in place:

Leaving the zipper zipped together, I positioned it so that the selvedge stitch covered half the teeth of the zipper. I like my zippers to be hidden. By positioning the selvedge stitch half over the teeth on each side, the zipper will be completely covered when the zipper is closed. It's important not to stretch the knitting while you're pinning so that you don't end up with a weirdly puckered zipper when it's sewn in.

Once I had the first side pinned all the way up, I started sewing. Here you can see how the selvedge stitch partially covers the teeth of the zipper:

I sewed straight through the zipper and the knitted fabric one stitch in from the edge, and as close to the zipper teeth as possible:

I tried to make small, even, straight stitches, but as you can see from the back of the zipper, I'm no seamstress. That's okay; no one will see the back of your zipper. You don't need to know how to sew. Just stitch as neatly as you can and take your time. It's not fun (at least, it's not fun for me), but it's not difficult.

Here's the first side all sewn in:

To sew the zipper to the other front, I unzipped the zipper and pinned the loose half to the opposite side. (You could pin it in place with the zipper closed, but I find this too difficult.)


To make sure I had the zipper lined up properly, I then rezipped the zipper:

It seemed to be lined up correctly, so I unzipped it again and sewed the second half of the zipper in place, and voila!

A completed zipper!

And almost completely hidden:


Now if I can just bring myself to tackle the concept of zippered pockets...