Design update

My latest design is a crossover top based on a favourite sweater that's just about falling apart. I'm doing well so far. Both fronts are done and I've done a goodly chunk of the back.

The back so far.

I've never made anything like this before. The biggest challenge so far has been working out how to do the slope to make the crossover. I had to make the slope, well, slopey, while at the same time making sure the piece was the right length, that the armholes were in the right place and the right size, that the shoulders were the right size. This took a lot of maths and several attempts at creating the slope. This was done using decreases, so another thing I had to take into acount was the direction of the decreases.

With the cross being right out front on the finished piece, there was no way to hide the decreases, so instead I had to make a feature of them. This meant making sure they leaned the right way – right on the right front, left on the left, so knit two together (k2tog) and slip slip knit (ssk) respectively. I really like the effect this has created.

This is the first time I've seen the two fronts
together, as it were. I like it.

The back is the easy bit. It's essentially the same as backs for all the other jumpers I've made, just with different maths. So my next challenge is the sleeves. I've done sleeves before, of course, but these are cap sleeves and I'm not really sure how to make them. I need to knit a kind of semi-circle and sew it into the armhole. But I'm not entirely sure how to knit a semi-circle.

I also need to add a border all around the crossover and round the collar. I'm not sure if this should be done all one go- that is, join the shoulders then starting at the bottom of one slope pick up stitches all the way round &ndash or to do each piece separately and then join. The former would look better, but that's going to be an awful lot of stitches to deal with. Will my circular needle even be long enough? The second option will be easier, but it just won't look as good. This is something to ponder.

A close-up of those decreases.

The other problem is that the thing just doesn't look like it's big enough. I measured the original top and made a swatch and worked out all the maths, so it should be just fine. Maybe blocking will sort it all out. But I'm actually taking a bit of a break from this project now. I've two things to complete to deadline &ndash one a baby cardie for a friend to give a pregnant work colleague and one a commission for a magazine. More on both of these later.