I’ve looked at this pattern for years but been put off by, of all things, the print - I find it difficult to read.

But that’s no reason not to make such a sweet jacket!

The original pattern says to cast off (on the body part) when you get to where the sleeves will go. The notes suggest leaving those stitches on a bit of wool and then knitting them up as you knit the sleeves.

“A bit of wool” sounds like a disaster waiting to happen, for me. So I put the underarm stitches on two stitch holders - each with half the stitches, and each with the opening toward the bit being knitted. This looks a bit messy (see the third picture down) but it works.

When you get to the end of the sleeve bit, don’t knit the last stitch. Instead, slip it on to the stitch holder (or slip the first stitch from that, on to your non-knitting needle, whatever works, just so that you end up with the last stitch from the sleeve and the first stitch from the underarm, together). That’s what you see happening in the fourth and fifth pictures. (The stitch holder is purple). In the next picture, you can see the stitches being knit together.

The next picture is the sleeve, and the next is the hood - I did the last four ridges of the hood in the contrast yarn. So far, I’m loving this - these poor kids might just have more of these than they will ever use!

12 12 12
And it’s (all but) done! I still need to sew up sleeve bits and figure out how to close it, but otherwise…

Notes for the future:

Bands of colour on the sleeves need to be a bit wider - try 6 or 8 rows/ridges

Find your tiny little double pointed needles, they’ll make the icord so much simpler!