Easy Pullover jersey – Knitting for dummies

For the longest time I have wanted a 100% cotton jersey.  I’ve looked at ones ready made for sale and on and off over the last few years I’ve  spent hours online searching for a pattern to make my own.  I’ve used search terms like, free pattern, easy, garter stitch jersey, jumper, pullover and so on, and even “knitting for dummies” but I have not found what I was looking for.  I haven’t knitted for myself in decades and did not want fancy stitches, I like good old plain and purl stitches.  I did not want ribbing on the sleeves or body and I wanted 3/4 sleeves or at least not long sleeves which hang past the wrist.

Last month the picture on the cover of the February/March edition of Stitches and Crafts magazine caught my eye, the shape and style of what they refer to as a knitted top designed by Natalia Valentin was just what I was looking for.  I bought the magazine and headed off to The Wool Centre.   I had a problem, the pattern was designed for a mohair blend yarn and only gave the brand name, not clarifying if it is Double knit (DK), 4 ply, chunky or none of those.  I very specifically wanted a pure cotton yarn.  The ladies at the Wool centre were awesome, from the needle size they figured I would need DK yarn and then looking at the specs of the yarn in the pattern worked out that I would need 3 balls of 250g Cotton yarn.  I chose the Elle yarn Cotton On in grey, I gather from their calculations that when switching yarns the length of each ball is more accurate to work on than the weight.  The length of yarn on a 250g ball of Cotton On is 415 meters.

This is my adaptation of Natalia’s pattern, I only used one colour but love the effect of plain (garter stitch) rows breaking the stocking stitch.  I am very tempted to make another doing the whole thing in garter stitch.

REQUIREMENTS

1200 meters of Double Knit (DK) yarn (I used 3 x 250g balls of Elle Cotton On)  This is what I bought for the middle size, the largest size will need a bit more, I had 40 grams left in the end)

One pair 4mm knitting needles

Row counter

MEASUREMENTS

To fit 81-87 (91 – 97, 101 – 107) cm bust (I am clothing size 12 and did the middle size)

Abbreviations

K = knit

p = purl

R(W)S = right (wrong) side

STITCHES USED

Garter stitch (gst) = knit every row

Stocking stitch (st.st)= knit right side, purl wrong side

PATTERN

FRONT AND BACK

Cast on 100 (110, 120) and work 10 rows in gst

1st to 10th row – starting with a k row, work in st.st

11th to 14th : gst

15th to 28th : st.st

29th – 30th : gst

31st -48th : st.st

49th to 50th : gst

51st to 64th : st.st

65th to 68th : gst

69th to 70th : st.st

71st to 74th : gst

75th to 76th : st.st

77th to 80th : gst

81st to 82nd : st.st

83rd to 86th : gst

87th to 100th : st.st

101st to 102nd : gst

103rd to 120th : st.st

121st to 122nd : gst

123rd to 172nd – st.st

173rd to 178th – gst

cast off

SLEEVES

Cast on 50 (58, 62) sts and work 6 rows in gst

While working pattern below increase 1 stitch at each end of 6th and every 6th row to the end, you will end on 86 (94, 98) stitches

1st to 10th : st.st

11th to 12th : gst

13th to 30th : st.st

31st to 32nd : gst

33rd to 46th : st.st

47th to 50th : gst

51st to 52nd : st.st

53rd to 56th : gst

57th to 58th : st.st

59th to 62nd : gst

63rd to 64th : st.st

65th to 68th : gst

69th to 82nd : st.st

83rd to 84th : gst

85th to 102nd : st.st

103rd to 104th :gst

105th to 110th : st.st

cast off

MAKE UP

Join shoulder seams leaving about 30cm open for neck.

Place centre of cast off edge of sleeves to shoulder seam and sew sleeve in position to front and back.  Join side and sleeve seams.

• Notes for Medium size :  Width 57 cm, length 61 cm, sleeve length 38.5 cm

The lovely thing about working with 100% cotton was that I was able to knit in summer as the yarn was not unpleasantly hot to work with.  I so love the feel of cotton