Yoke of top down sweater looks wonky

[YarnBall]

I'm attempting my first sweater ever. It's a top down sweater. I'm really struggling with it. At first, I couldn't get the st count to match the pattern. Then, I got it down but now that I've gotten more rows done, I see that my work is totally off.

 

I attached a photo showing how my first 8 rows of the yoke are looking. The four "corners" for separating the sleeves, back and front look totally uneven! And the piece itself won't lie flat. It's so wavy! Any suggestions what I'm doing wrong?

[magiccrochetfan]

I wouldn't worry about the not laying flat, you know it is going to go over shoulders which are also not flat.

 

But the corners don't look even to me. The upper left and bottom right have a point that I don't see on the other two corners. Reminds me of a skewed granny square and so I wonder if you should have turned between rounds. Or possibly your increases are getting out of line.

 

What is the name and location of the pattern?

[magiccrochetfan]

Also is your gauge right? It looks overly tight to me.

[YarnBall]

Hi Kathy! Thanks so much for getting back to me so quickly. The pattern is here http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/scheuber-pullover-adult. It's by Katy Peterson.

 

The pattern calls for joined rounds so there is no turning. I think the part that I'm messing up on is, at the marked st's, the pattern says to do Herr dc, ch1, Herr dc. Then, I do that again anytime I come to a ch1 space. I think maybe I'm not recognizing the ch1 space correctly. I might be doing that cluster of st's in the space after the ch1.

 

I do tend to crochet very tightly so I shoulf check my gauge again. I did check the first go-round and it was right on. But I've frogged and redone this multiple times now. Better check again.

[Granny Square]

The skew seems way more pronounced than the 'granny square skew' that happens when you don't turn your work when you make one of those giant granny square blankets.  It almost looks like your marker is drifting each round, where it should 'move over' each round but stay in the same relative spot.  

 

A typical top down raglan's increase lines should be coming down at a 45º , yours looks almost 90º.

 

It sounds like the chain 1 should be the marked stitch, is that the corner?  Commonly on raglans you increase before and after the marked stitch (so the increases are on both sides of each sleeve, and each side of the front and back).

[magiccrochetfan]

looking at the closeup photo, it seems you should have a distinct open line where the raglan ch1 spaces are.  do you have that?  i don't see it in your photo.

 

i agree with GrannySquare, and with what you said about maybe going into the st after the one you should be,  it looks like your increases are drifting.

i would mark every ch1 as soon as i made it to be sure I would find it easily.  

 

what yarn are you using?  

 

(and apparently this doesn't apply to this pattern, but we can turn after a joined round; example being Doris Chan's topdown pullovers like Jewel , Tall Latte.  doing so keeps the stitches lined up correctly instead of swirling, when we don't want a swirl.)

[YarnBall]

Thanks Granny Square and Kathy. I don't see a distinct open line. Ugh. I think my marker is definitely drifting. I have been moving it right away after stitching into each marked st but I think must be marking the wrong st. I attached a couple of photos to show where I marked it (the safety pin). I think I should be marking the bigger empty space rather than the smaller space to the left of it.

 

I also checked my gauge and it is definitely off. I counted 16 st's when there should be 14. The yarn I'm using is Briggs&Little Regal 100% wool. This is my first time using 100% wool and it's a rather "fuzzy" one too so it makes it a bit harder to see the st's at times.

[YarnBall]

Hi again Crocheville! I've been steadily working on my sweater since I last posted. I was able to get my gauge and my drifting stitch markers to work the proper way.

 

Now that I'm further along, I'm seeing a new problem. My seam is going diagonal. I think it's called a "travelling seam"? The pattern works this sweater in the round. Each round is joined with a slip st to the first st. Then I do a ch2+HerrDC in that first st then continue on doing HerrDC in each st. Am I doing something wrong or is this the way the seam in this pattern is supposed to look?

 

I did some digging around online and found this tutorial for an almost invisible straight seam: http://mrsmicawber.blogspot.ca/2014/04/mrs-ms-mock-invisible-join-new-crochet.html?m=1. Is this the best way to get a straight seam with this pattern? If it can work, how do I do it with the HerrDC?

[magiccrochetfan]

I have zero experience with herringbone dc, but i doubt that you've done anything wrong.  I don't know if that invisible technique would straighten the seam, i guess you'll have to swatch to see.  

 

I think there is enough difference in each of our individual techniques that some people may be able to get a straight seam in this pattern w/o changing anything.  Personally my sts seem to have a good bit of lean, which may be one reason I like turned rounds for garments.  If this were my project, I would be sure to try it on and maybe even wear it for a bit to see how the seam lays; does it crawl around making the diagonal even more noticeable or does it stay put?  Also i would take what you've made so far and launder it, again to see how it behaves, because it might be less or more noticeable after laundering.  Then wear it again after laundering.  

 

 I notice there aren't any notes re the stitch or the seam on the pattern page and it looks like the only project entry may be your own---projcets can be good sources of info.  

You might look at the designers other online places  http://www.ravelry.com/designers/katy-petersen to see if there are any posts about this seam, or contact her directly.

[YarnBall]

Thanks magiccrochetfan for all the different suggestions. I think turned rounds would be the better way for me to go for future garments.

 

Yes... the one and only project for this pattern on Ravelry is mine! Argh... I knew choosing this as my first pattern would come back to bite me!!

 

 

Anyway, I made a swatch using a different technique to compensate for the slanted seam: http://blog.irarott.com/mystery-of-slanted-seams-and-crochet-stitches/. You do a "hook over" instead of a YO. It actually seemed to work.

 

But I couldn't bear to frog the weeks of crocheting it took me to get to this point so I tried on my sweater. It doesn't look as horrible as I thought it would. There is a slant to it and it does look a bit odd... but I can live with it, considering it's my first sweater!

 

My plan is to complete the sweater, launder and block it... hopefully it will be even less slanted after that.

[magiccrochetfan]

I'm glad it doesn't look as bad as you feared! Probably it's not something anyone else would ever really notice.

[Granny Square]

Call it a design feature.   Yeah, that's it.  Not that that's ever happened to me or anything (walks away whistling...)

 

I agree, probably no one but you will notice the slight skew.  And now you know there are ways to mask the one-side-facing-slanty 'seam', so you could avoid it in the future.  If you'd ripped back to the underarm to start working by turning, the stitching would look a little different (since you have alternating front and back sides facing, not just the front side).  Not necessarily a bad thing, lots of tops switch colors or stitch patterns between the yoke and the body -- just something to be aware of.

[YarnBall]

I love your cheeky take on it GrannySquare! ???? I realize now that it is best for this particular sweater to be done with joined rounds. The HerrDC stitch slants so it would look dramatically different if I turned each row.