king Cole pattern 3318, have made the romper and followed exactly including doing the neckband which was tight to do once shoulder seams sewn up but I got the 49 stitches on 3.25 needles as it said. I have completed the neckband and its way too small to fit even a perm baby let alone a 0-3mth old.
Has any one else used this pattern and had the same thing? or could they check any baby jumper patterns by king Cole for neckband amount of stitches please.
really annoyed as the romper is lovely and has taken me a while as I’m not a quick knitter but the neck has just ruined it all and I don’t know what to do. It has a back opening so getting it on may not be a problem but fastening it up would cause my grandson to turn very blue!!
any ideas on how to rectify?
I have emailed king Cole tonight for their advice but thought I would try here too.
many thanks
Welcome!
Oh gosh, that’s terrible. If the neckband is tight before you pick up sts for the collar then you probably have to re-work the pattern for the front neck. I know this is a pain to do but for such a cute pattern, at this point, it’s worth it. You need to start the neck bind off earlier than the pattern indicated. That’ll give you a larger neck. Once you’ve done that, pin the shoulders in place and see what the opening looks like. It should look too large. That’s good. Then you can go ahead and join the shoulders and pick up sts around the neck. You’ll have to pick up more sts than the pattern indicates and maybe work the collar on larger size needles.
Thank you, but what do you mean bind off the neck earlier?
The pattern says to sew up the shoulder seams before picking up the neckband stitches, but it made picking up very tricky especially when getting to the last back stitches.
Not sure how easy this is going to be in undoing my sewing & knitting.
I’ve got to do something though as the neck is so small.
That is adorable.
You’d have to take out the shoulder seam and undo the front shoulders down some number of rows past the current center neck bind off. If you start the center neck bind off on an earlier row, that’ll extend the neck opening. So for example, if the pattern says to bind off the center sts for the neck after 10 inches, maybe bind off at ;9.5 inches (you’ll have to judge this depending on how tight you think the neck is).
I know this is painful but you’ve come so far and so well with this that it’s worth the extra effort.
It is lovely & i was really pleased until i finished the neck!
So if i start it say 4 rows earlier, to where the blue stripe begins maybe, i could probaly get an extra 4 or 5 stitches in on each side on the pick up? Making a total of 59 stiitches which would be better.
When i do this though do i stick to same decreae instructions? I wouldnt want less than the 11 stitches on each side for shoulders as wont match back.
Thank you
Yes, that’s right. You still want the back to match up with the front at the shoulders.
Pick up more sts and perhaps work the collar on a size larger needle to make sure that doesn’t narrow the neck too much. You could even cut down on the number or rows of ribbing at the neck if necessary. (Even picking up sts, knitting a row and binding off for a little rolled collar will work.)
well I got a same day response from King Cole who have apologised, after looking at the pattern it is indeed way to small but the original designer has now left as the pattern is fairly old and they need to do an amendment.
The pocket car motif instructions on how to read the chart is also wrong which I pointed out and they will correct that too.
The lady suggested I do the neckband for the next size up or even the one after that but I know there is no way I would fit 65 stitches in, it was very tight with the 49 as you have to sew up shoulder seams first.
I have re knitted the sleeves as the rib on that was too small for a babies upper arm, instead of 3.25mm needles I used 3.75mm which has given more stretch and made slightly bigger. I didn’t think using this size needle on the neckband would still be big enough so think it will be your suggestion of redoing from the front decrease.
thanks for your help.
Thanks so much for posting the reply from King Cole. I’m really sorry to hear that but I do think you can get this to work by expanding the neck opening. I’ve had to do this on a baby sweater before.
You don’t have to be too exact on the number of sts that you pick up. Just make sure you end with an even number for k1,p1 rib.
I did it!
Took it 4 rows earlier & increased neck stitches by 10.
Horrible job & never doing the pattern again.
Well done! The little romper is adorable.
