Please lovely knitters, I am reaching out to you in the hope that you can help me. I am knitting an Icelandic sweater using a pattern that has a fairly short asymmetric neck zipper, but I cannot make any sense of the pattern instructions. The overall look is for the zip to be virtually hidden in the yoke, and it goes from around the armpit to the neck. I fear that something has been lost in translation as I cannot make any sense of the instructions.
The pattern calls for me to knit the body, then the two sleeves, all in the round and then to join them for the yoke section. All good to that point and I do have the required 294 sts. But then here is where I get stuck. This is what it says:
“On next round start opening for zipper. Work pattern from chart 1. Put cast off the first 4 sts and immediately cast on 4 new sts, which are purled in every round. Continue round in St st and increase 1 st at one of the underarm. You have 291 sts + 4 purl sts. Work pattern from chart 1. Do not count purl sts.”
What does “put cast off the first 4 sts and immediately cast on 4 new sts” mean? Any help would be gratefully appreciated as I really do not understand what its supposed to look like.