I am knitting my first baby cardigan. It is knit from the top down. The body of the cardi is finished and I am now at the part of the pattern where I need to work the sleeves. I have never knit sleeves before, so I want to make sure I do this right. The pattern states to “pu 4 stitches on the edge of the few that were cast on, knit the other 23 and join in round.” There are 23 stitches on my scrap yarn…so does this mean that I need to pu the 4 stitches that are knit before the purple yarn in the pic I provided? Since they are already knit, how do I do this? I cannot find any videos helping to explain this to me so I am hoping that someone here will have the answer and/or a video link!
They want you to pick up 4 stitches on the underarm section where you cast on the extra stitches. Then you’ll knit the 23 stitches that are on waste yarn and then you’ll join and knit in the round.
I’ve made a lot of sweaters and I find the easiest way to knit the stitches that are on waste yarn is by putting them on another circ, preferrably with smaller needles. Then you take out the waste yarn and knit them off the smaller needle with your sleeve needle that has already picked up the underarm stitches.
Do you see where the cast on sts are between the sleeve sts? The armhole will look something like this __/ and you pick up sts in the __ part of it, which is between the sts on the purple yarn. They’re knit on the body, but the the other direction and you pick up in the base of them to make sts for your sleeve. There’s a video for picking up sts on the Tips page, and while that shows picking up from the edge of a piece, you do the same thing in those CO sts. Just insert the needle into a stitch, wrap the yarn around it and pull through.
Oh! Okay, Sue got it. You just take a new skein of yarn and stick your needle under a loop (I use a single loop) and wrap the yarn and pull it through just like a reg knit stitch.
It can be a bit loose, but after a few rows and a tug on the tail it usually is fine. I do find that sometimes in the area between the pu stitches and the cast on stitches on waste yarn there can be a bit of a hole. What I do quite often is just pick up an extra stitch on either side of those pu stitches and continue knitting. Then knit two together on the next row at that spot. It doesn’t show and is under the arm anyway. Cleans that right up!
Yes, I pick up an extra st before and after the ones I pick up in the cast on sts too, didn’t want to get her too confused though, until she understands where to pick up in the first place.
