Two Sleeves at Once, While Attached
Agnes could have been knit entirely while my last sweater was blocking. So I’ll be squeezing in one more sweater for the Summer Sweater Knitalong. As you can see, I have a lot of help in doing this.
I was finished with the body and then decided to rip back and add a few extra rows of length, just because I have a longish torso.
When it came time to knit the sleeves, I tried something I saw Anna (Jadzeea on Ravelry) do. She knit two sleeves at once from the armholes on her sweater for the knit along. I’m using bulky yarn and several Denise cords clicked together, so I wasn’t sure it would be a smooth transition.
The first few rows I had to be careful to keep my stitches tight enough, but after that it was like regular magic loop. In case you’re a non-knitting reader, or my grandmother, I’ll say that magic loop is when you use one really long needle to knit a sleeve or sock in the round instead of using five double-pointed needles. In this case, I am doing that with both of my sleeves at once, on the same long circular.
To do this I transferred the held stitches for the right sleeve to my circular as I would for magic loop. I then picked up the underarm stitches and placed a marker, as directed, then knit about 4 of the held stitches. Then I them moved them around on the circular where the top half of the sleeve stitches (starting with the one’s I would be knitting next) were on the top part of the needle and the bottom half on the bottom. I made sure there were a few held stitches sandwiching the picked up stitches on the bottom half to avoid any underarm gaps in the knitting.
Then I followed the same process on the other sleeve, using a smaller circular and a different ball of yarn, to load them on and rearrange them. I then transferred the top stitches of the left sleeve to the top magic loop needle and the bottom stitches to the bottom needle, sliding them down next to the right sleeve.
It is not as easy on Denise needles because the cords are thicker and not as bendy and the connections sometimes break. I think one of my cord connecters and a few needle connections are stripped from years of knitting. I’m going to try ordering some replacement parts before seeking super long circulars in larger needle sizes because I think I’ll be doing sleeves this way from now on.
I've done this a couple times but I've never been smart enough to do the top of the sleeves on one needle and the bottom of the sleeves on another. 🙂 Next time! This sweater is looking really cute! I can't wait to see it all finished and modeled.
I always wanted to do this but I was worried about things getting tangled and I never know if I could maybe use one skein for both sleeves. I'll try next time 🙂
Thanks for the visual on this. I'm working on an Jane Richmond Oatmeal Sweater right now and this trick will come in really handy!
So hearing about your Denise's popping at the connections make me feel better. I have had that happen to me countless times but when I have mentioned it to a few of my friends who have Denise's and have had them longer than me they think I'm crazy and that I must be doing something to make that happen. I'm glad it's not just me. Also your sweater looks great!
Thank you, Vanessa. I'm interested to see your Sedum finished. That's one I love and want to make someday…
It's a bit to manage at first, Elena, but once both sleeves are on its no harder than when they're separate. If I were doing a fine gauged sweater, I might do a few rows of each sleeve separately before putting them together- to prevent any gaps between stitches.
Oh that's very similar in style to this. I love Oatmeal! It's the kind of sweater I think of as comfort knitting 🙂
It may have something to do with us twisting as we knit. (Rohn Strong posted about this on his blog recently). I have used my Denise needles for years without problems, but honestly, I am knitting much more and much faster so it could be my knitting style has changed along with stripped connectors. I'd love to try Addi Clicks sometime to see if a different brand works better for me.
That could be it. I like addi's but they are so expensive I think that one day I will probably switch over to knit picks, my one friend has and she loves hers. It is also a bonus that they have they at a lower price now.