Pretty Little Cardy

Nothing looks prettier than a little girl in a hand knitted cardigan. All smiles and blooming optimism. Hand knits always speak of care and attention, time spent in crafting something special for a treasured child.

This one uses colour and a relatively simple pattern to excellent affect. It was quick to knit with no shaping in the armhole or sleeve. I have used a New Zealand Merino and Cashmere blend made in NZ by Zealana.

Despite this being a New Zealand made yarn, it seems to have few stockist in NZ. I found it at Knit World Studio in Cuba Street, Wellington when we went on holiday recently. Not stocked in Christchurch unfortunately, but the website lists lots of US and UK  stockist.



The pattern is by Touch Yarns: 'Child's Patchwork Cardigan', design number TY0601. Touch is another excellent New Zealand yarn company that manufactures in NZ from New Zealand wool.

The pattern calls for five colours. In typical spare of the moment stash gathering fashion, I only bought four colours: Pale Jade, Kowhai, Rose Petal and Milford Fiord. At $14 a ball, this is no cheap cardy; so instead of buying another colour I decided to be a little creative with their distribution. Thus proving you don't have to stick to the pattern colour guides to achieve a great result. 

The colour join as seen on the wrong side
 of the work
 

To join the colours on the back be sure to wrap the second colour around the first at the join. Otherwise you will end up with two separate pieces of knitting.






I knitted the sleeves at the same time, as I find it saves time on measuring later. Because of all the stripe colour changes and working from both ends of the balls to avoid having to ravel off and break the yarn, this turned into a spaghetti nightmare. It was worth it in the end, however it made this part of the project hard to work on over coffee and cake in my favourite cafes.

As you can see I ran out of pink before the sleeves were finished! Oh well ....  unique customisation.





Sewing the shoulder seams together usig mattress stitch.












The neck all ready to have the band cast on.












Knitting the neck band.















Sewing the sleeve on. Pinning it with safety pins makes it easier to sew with no sharp pins to work around.









I decided to depart from the pattern and make a couple of crocheted flowers to decorate the front.

Large Flower
Work 6 chain st. then join into a loop.
1st row: work 1 chain, then 12 stitches double crochet through the centre; join to the beginning stitch.
2nd row: work 1 chain, then 2 double crochet into each stitch. Join to beginning stitch.
3rd row: work 8 chain and join into the circle at 3rd stitch. Repeat 8 times.


Small Flower
Work 4 chain st. then join into a loop.
1st row: work 1 chain, then 8 stitches double crochet through the centre, join to the beginning stitch.
2nd row: work 1 chain, then 2 double crochet into each stitch. Join to beginning stitch.
3rd row: work 6 chain and join into the circle at 2nd stitch. Repeat 8 times.

 

 I also made this butterfly by crocheting a chain, then filling it in with double crochet.
Sewing it onto the cardy keeps its shape.










Little Miss 3 said she wanted butterfly buttons. Luckily I managed to find the right size and colour, so she was thrilled with her new cardy! Happy little girl!