How the Sweater Curse Ended: Cotton Soldotna Crop

Here’s something a little different–a knitting project.  In fact, it’s an unblogged sweater from 2019!  I do have some fall sewing projects to show you, but I need to take some pictures first, so instead we have a summer sweater.

Just like so many knitters, I fell for the Soldotna Crop sweater by Boyland Knitworks when it came out.  A short-sleeved sweater is kind of a funny thing to knit, but when I saw this, I saw my opportunity to knit a sweater that was cropped and short-sleeved, requiring less yarn (and therefore less money for supplies).  It was also an opportunity to dig into another colorwork project.  After a few stranded knitting colorwork projects, I was in love.

Before I started sewing, I knitted.  And with one very well-fitting exception, all the sweaters I made were massive.  There was a lot I didn’t know that I’m learning now.  Anyway, after taking two years to knit a sweater for my husband that was still massive after I intentionally shrunk it in the washer and dryer, I was done.  (Check out my Craft Fails if you want to see the sweater.) After hanging around Pintuck & Purl for a few years, though, I got slowly sucked back in by all the amazing knitters that I kept meeting there.

I started thinking about color and value (i.e. darkness and lightness of each color) and tested out my ideas by tracing an image of a finished sweater, scanning it into the computer, and using it as my own little coloring page.  My goals were to use colors that I loved in a range of values similar to the original.  Having good value contrast can really make a design stand out, even more than the color can.

Looking at the original in both color and black and white helped me figure out where I wanted to place my colors.

Once I had that figured out, I colored my picture and redrew the pattern chart with my colors in it so I wouldn’t get confused while knitting.

I initially chose an inexpensive synthetic yarn, Berroco Comfort DK, but the colors weren’t exactly what I wanted.  Sweaters are so expensive to knit, and I was trying to keep the cost down, but I just wasn’t happy with my purchase.  That being said, I do really like this yarn and have since used it to make a few hats.

So, I returned what I could of the Berroco yarn and eventually got what I really wanted from Pintuck & Purl, Mirasol Pima Kuri DK Cotton Yarn.

You can see all the colors I considered, followed by a grayscale picture that helped me pick the ones I wanted based on their values.

Part of the joy of colorwork for me is the colors and I loved these.  My choices (left to right):  Smoky Mountain, Cabernet, Lime Twist, and Adventurine.

I made a few good-sized swatches in the round in part of the colorwork pattern and then threw a swatch in the washer and dryer, which was how I wanted to block/care for my finished sweater.  After it was done I measured it, and my husband ran the numbers through Excel so we could check what size sweater the gauge I had knitted at would give me, accounting for shrinkage after blocking.  Once I thought I had what I wanted, I cast on.  I was nervous, but I really wanted to try, so I went for it.  I cast on sometime in March 2019 and worked on it little by little over the summer.

I knitted a size L, which turned out well.  My measurements put me in a L, except for the arms, which I should have knit in a 2XL, but I did a straight L, and it was fine.  The neck area is a bit odd and is not as open as the picture on the pattern.

If I were to do this all over again, I would cast on closer to the start of the colorwork and just have a small roll neck.

I have noticed that my gauge tends to loosen over time, which works great for a sweater knitted from the top down, as it will naturally get a little larger near my hips.  I lengthened this a bit, since the cropped original version was just too cropped for me.  Once I had knitted down to my high hip, I finished things off.

Below is a picture of the inside before I wove in my ends.

I tried the sweater on after binding off and…IT FIT!!!!  Now, I won’t tell you there are no mistakes (there are), and the back of the neck it a little weird, but…I LOVE THIS SWEATER.  I had MADE a sweater, and it FIT.  I was over the moon.  For a long time, I just kept it out so I could look at it every time I walked by.  It looks good as a t-shirt, and also works as a vest-type sweater over a collared shirt.  With this sweater, I think I finally broke the curse of the too-big sweaters.  😉

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