button tricks

 

I’m finally getting around to doing the buttons for ‘Granville’ - I wanted 3 or 4 large buttons just at the top but large buttons seem to be very hard to come by unless you have access to a good button shop which I don’t - we’re down to the local Fabricland as virtually the only source for buttons - even Wal-Mart doesn’t  have them any longer....so, not much  to choose from. And, when you have an off-colour like this ‘mushroom grey’ it’s really limited. Even discounting the size I wanted, it was tough - pewter was the closest thing, but size-wise the largest I could find were 7/8"/23mm - not big enough. I did find some reasonably-priced large black ones, but they are pretty boring and black buttons would limit what I could wear with it...I had some pearly grey buttons that were big enough and sort of the right colour, but they're really ugly and cheapened the finished look...what to do?

What to do? I didn’t want to wait for my next trip out of town to maybe get lucky, so I put two buttons together! The trick - line up the holes for sewing, of course and with my trusty, hot-glue gun, put a dab of glue on the bottom button, press the top one in place and hold for a second or two...

Most buttons are not totally flat, either top or bottom and, the bit of wax/glue makes a cushion between - what I did was...on a piece of Styrofoam, pin the buttons with two darning needles to align the holes and hold the buttons in place. Angle the needles out slightly so the top button can be pulled up to apply the glue and then quickly press down to flatten and set. If you mess up, it let cool completely and use a flat blade to pry apart, pick the glue off and try again...

Button detail

It’s buttonholes time...some people dread this and actually make it much more difficult than it really is - they try formulas and all kind of math things that are way too hard. I find the easiest way and stick with it!! No calculator needed, I guarantee it!

So, I’m doing a stockinette hemmed band, knit horizontally - so you know exactly how many stitches in the length of the band. Make the button band first to be sure it works and then you know you’re not experimenting with the length of the band and putting all the work of buttonholes into it if it’s not going to be right (been there, done that!)

For this style (and to make it even easier) I’m going with an uneven number of buttons - that means a centre one and the end ones are going to be the same distance from each end (this will give you a little room to adjust if necessary) - I think you call that symmetrical but I didn’t want to get too complicated-sounding.... it’s easy so far... so, I pull out those needles slightly so you can see where they are. On the end ones, making them the same distance from the end means you don’t need to worry about which is the top of the band and which is the bottom...

So, I’ve got exact placement on 3 of the 7 buttonholes and 2 more to go between the end and centre on each side. Rather than counting (and re-counting) needles, I use the ruler marked on the straight side of the needle selector to measure the spacing between needles - it’s much quicker to adjust and get the spacing exact this way. Now all I have to do is finish up!!

Maybe I should tell you, this is going to be the March pattern for standard gauge - tons of details to make planning, altering, knitting and finishing go easier, like when do you need an extra stitch for seaming or not. The yarn is Yeoman Yarns Brittany, used double stranded, so get 2 cones! I see Sue at http://www.knititnow.com/ is going to be bringing Yeoman Yarns to the US  - Pat Holbrook at http://www.cardiknits.com/  in Canada.
About those buttons, I know what you're thinking - what's she thinking? - I had 7, the approximate size, but I agree, they really don't anything for the cardigan... wait and see!!

(bet you didn’t expect to hear from me again so soon! oh, and in case you haven't figured it out yet, if you click on the photos, they enlarge.)