the importance of actually reading...

I told you about the WCD cardis that are in No 52 and how I was going to remake the green one for myself - well, I did do that, using that beautiful light olive colour I had. Now, here’s a perfect example of what happens when you don’t read the instructions because you think you know what you’re doing!
In reality, I made both of the ruffled cardis back in August last year. They were held over to this Spring issue because there were too many patterns to all fit in No 51 and those two were the most appropriate to hold over for the next issue. So, when it came to remaking this pattern, it was a case of - I wrote the pattern, I know what I’m doing! - or I thought I did anyway.
I did make a few changes - who doesn’t, second time around, but the changes actually involved using vertical darts in the body of the sweater - instead of shaping the garment by decreasing and increasing at the side seams, I did vertical darts, to test out my theories and to have another sample for some of the workshops I’ll be teaching this year. I have an article on darts in the new issue, called ‘Darting Around’, dealing with horizontal darts - used in the bust area - and vertical darts, in plain stockinette AND in patterned fabrics - be sure to take a look at it - you might be surprised. Anyway, I made this olive cardi with vertical darts using the garter bar to move stitches over after the decreases and increases - that part went well.
When it came to the bands, I vaguely recalled making quite a few swatches - the bands are knit circular on the double bed and there is a really cool chained edge to it that is actually started off with a very loose row on the cast-on, and chained after the piece is removed from the machine. Anyway, the buttonholes were a bit of a challenge - because of the circular - I think this is my first time to come up with a technique for my no-sew buttonhole that worked for circular on a horizontal band. So, now, I ‘skimmed’ the instructions, made the band, attached it and got the garment off the machine. It was only later when I was chaining the edge that I realized my clever buttonholes had failed! What the ??? I looked at Sue’s cardi (I haven’t given it up yet!!) and her buttonholes are beautiful! Mine aren’t closed up on the last side.
Now, I specifically recalled remaking her buttonhole band and rewriting the instructions - what happened?? I’m sort of panicking at this point - the magazine is printed and on it’s way to me - I can’t change anything!!! I went to the instructions printed from the pfd proof copy I got back from the printers that I used to reknit from - what a relief!! the correct instructions are there - I just didn’t read the whole thing, figuring I knew what I was doing - huh! After casting off the stitches for the buttonhole, I was supposed to bring out ONLY all the EMPTY needles, which would cancel the circular setting just for those needles and give me a zigzag over the buttonhole needles, which would then be lifted off and twisted to ‘e’ wrap back on - this is what closes up the second side of the hole - so watch out! Be sure to read all the directions and apply them in the proper place! Let me know how you make out!