06-02-2022

Start: make 5 ch, join with ss into a ring.

1st round: 4ch (=1dc,1ch), 1dc + 1ch 11 times. Join with ss in 3rd ch. 12 dc.

2nd round: 3 ch (= 1dc), 1dc, 1ch, 2dc, 1ch in the remaining ch spaces. Join with ss in 3rd ch. 12 groups of 2 dc.

3rd round: 3 ch (= 1dc), 2dc in ch space, 1ch, 3dc, 1ch in the remaining ch spaces. Join with ss in 3rd ch. 12 groups of 3 dc.

4th round: 3ch (= 1 tr), 1tr, 3ch, 2tr, (=1st corner), 1ch, (2dc,1ch,2dc) in next ch space, 1ch, (2dc,1ch,2dc) in next ch space, 1ch, (2tr, 3ch, 2tr) (=2nd corner), repeat * to * 2 times, 1ch, (2dc, 1ch, 2dc) in the next two ch spaces, 1ch. Join with ss to 4th ch.

Edited to add:
5th round: ch 2 to begin, sc around. For the corners, ch 1 to increase.

09-02-2022

I was inspired to make this cardigan by this course on Domestika: https://www.domestika.org/en/courses/1399-granny-square-c...

Also, from that course, I found a link to this excellent garment shaping reference: https://www.craftyarncouncil.com/standards/body-sizing

Looking ahead to joining:
https://gourmetcrochet.blogspot.com/2010/01/flat-braid-jo... looks promising.
More ideas: https://www.mooglyblog.com/join-crochet-squares/

I’ve got eight squares done and I think I like this design. Now I’ve got to get out one of my sweaters that approximates the fit I want and measure it up to see how many squares I’ll actually need.

I still think maybe I’m a little bit crazy to be making all this up on my own. Oh well.

09-02-2022

If I’m doing the math right, by the time round 4 is done there should be 20 stitches on a side. I’m going to reinforce the whole thing with a row 5 of single crochet. Worried that I’m not stitching into the right spot - I’m still too new at this! Hoping the stitch counting helps.

10-02-2022

Project design calculations:

Each square approx 11 cm
Round 1 & 2 colour uses 2 grams
Round 3 colour uses 1 gram
Round 4 & 5 colour uses 3 grams
Total square uses 6 grams

All squares will have Mocha as colour 4 & 5.
Mocha: 99 squares x 3g is approx 300g, add 200g for joins. Will need 5 balls of Mocha.

Other colours: 99 squares x 3 g is approx 300g. Each ball is 100g, have five colours total, for 500g. Should be plenty?

Sample/target cardigan measurements:
Cardigan width (back) = 60 cm
Cardigan width (front panel) = 30 cm each
Cardigan height shoulder to hem = 60 cm
Cardigan sleeve length: 60 cm
Cardigan sleeve height armpit to shoulder: 17.5 cm
Hood height: round to 30 cm
Hood depth: round to 30 cm

Therefore, back body will need 36 squares.
Side front panel (x2) will need 18 squares.
Each sleeve (x2) will need 18 squares.
Hood will need 9 squares.

Total project will require 99 squares. EDIT: I can’t count, total project will require 117 squares.

Will also need slightly more Mocha for joining, maybe one extra skein.

Total yardage = 117 squares x 6g per square, or approx 700 grams, which is approx 7 skeins. Currently have 10 in stash - 5 Mocha, one in each of Denim, Guava, Dewberry, Sunny, Neptune. Should work?

13-02-2022

14/99 squares done, blocked the first 8 - so much better when they’re blocked! Also decided I like the look of one round in the first colour then rounds 2 and 3 in the next colour, then rounds 4 and 5 in the mocha. They’ll make a nice mix, some with larger centre and some with smaller centre, I think.

Still waiting for my teal (“Neptune”) yarn to arrive. It went from Calgary to Richmond BC, the opposite direction of me. Sigh.

19-02-2022

Just finished square #29 and ran out of the first skein of Mocha - on track to use five skeins total at most.

Have made a spreadsheet to make sure I’m making mostly the same number of each colour. Peak yarn nerd!

22-02-2022

Dammit, just realized I made an error in counting for the arms. Adding 18 more squares to the required total: 117. I currently have 39 done, which is exactly 1/3 of the required total, just over two weeks into the project.

06-03-2022

Paused this for a week to make the knight’s helmet. Back on it and just finished 53nd square of 117. 45% of squares complete.

09-03-2022

Finished the second skein of Mocha on square #56.

16-03-2022

72 of 117 done. Weighed a few balls of yarn and I have more than half of each left, so I should have plenty to finish the project.

This is the annoying stretch, when you’re a little tired of making squares, but mostly a little anxious that it will look like carp when you finally stitch all those squares together. So much time and yarn invested. Will this actually work?

23-03-2022

80 squares, just finished the third skein of Mocha. If it’s about 24ish squares per skein, I should have about half a skein left for joining. Should work?

29-03-2022

I think I might start stitching a few of these together, maybe starting from the hood and working downward, so I don’t make more squares than I actually need. (At 104/117 squares now.)

Also had the idea that a nice line of SC stripes down each centre panel and around the hood in Mocha and then maybe Neptune Mocha Sunny Mocha or similar might be nice. Or it might be too much? We’ll try and find out!

30-03-2022

With eight squares to go, I could no longer stand the stress and anticipation of fretting over the joins. I have been dreading this part - what if I made all these squares and then I couldn’t get the joins right, or what if the joins were dreadfully tedious? I needed to try a few squares and find out.

I watched a few tutorials and decided to try a simple whip stitch join, knowing I could pull it back out again if I hated it. (I had originally planned do a SC join as recommended in the Domesitika course I’d been following, but my edges are a little wonky and I thought it might be too challenging to get the edges perfectly aligned.)

To my surprise and delight, the whip stitch join was easy and quick and came together nicely. Phew!! Now I’m excited to finish it!

02-04-2022

Finished all 117 squares! Let the great joining begin!

Used up the fourth skein of Mocha on the penultimate square so I have an entire skein left for joining and a SC border. Might get fancy with a coloured row or two on the ends of the sleeves or maybe even the inside edges - we’ll see how long the assembly and joining takes.

For shoulder shaping: decide how big you want the neck space to be. In my case, probably two squares. On each side of the back panel, plus each of the front panel sides, do the following to shape the neckline. Count the stitches from the shoulder edge to the neckline. Half of those will be worked in DC, closest to the neck. For the remaining half, divide by 3. Working from the shoulder edge, do 1/6 of neckline stitches in slip stitch, 1/6 in SC, 1/6 in HDC and 1/3 in DC.

03-04-2022

Ha, this has been an adventure. When I started joining the sleeves, I was disheartened to realize my estimate for the sleeve width would not accomodate my generous biceps (partly due to my peasant heritage and partly due to summers spent paddling a kayak.) Instead of three squares around, it will have to be four squares. I kept working on the joins, but was seriously considering other possible projects to salvage all the squares (a set of pillow slips? A blanket?) as the odds of this actually making a sweater that would fit me seemed increasingly remote. I also realized I had underestimated my hood size by half. I didn’t think I had enough yarn or interest to make a dozen more squares.

However, I kept stitching bits together and realized that I had given myself quite a generous back panel side, and that would give me some lovely positive ease under the arms and a dropped shoulder, which would in turn make the sleeves require only five instead of six squares in length. As of this morning I’ve completed both sleeves and three rows across the back of the shoulders. Just working on the shoulder shaping so I can begin adding squares to the front panel. Currently considering only two instead of three wide, or maybe starting with two and adding half triangles to transition to three? This is definitely a work in progress, but I may yet have a cardigan out of it!

04-04-2022

Was curious about the waste from the colour changes in the granny squares, so I saved them all up in my jar. 13 g of cut ends for the squares themselves, another 7 g from the joins. 20g of waste from 1000g of project yarn. Not that bad!

07-04-2022

I optimistically (perhaps foolishly) updated this project to be 90% completed when I finished the 117 squares. I had NO IDEA what an endeavour it would be to join up all these squares. I’ve been joining them into strips, then joining the strips into blocks. Even though I found weaving in the ends as I made the squares to be an easy task, the joins have made so many more ends. I’m hours into the joining with both sleeves and the back panel done and I’m not quite sure how wide the front panels will be (thinking about a half square folded transition on the front panels to make them a bit wider), but at least a cardigan is in fact emerging. I still need to figure out the hood structure too, but I think I have enough squares for that.

Maybe another week to finish the joins and the hood and weave in the ends, and then I need to do at least one sc round across all the edges, maybe more if I’m feeling fancy and can stand to look at this thing anymore!

08-04-2022

My final and perhaps most satisfying “EUREKA!” moment was today when I figured out how to build the hood. I am so pleased with myself!! I was dragging my heels a bit just because I wasn’t 100% confident on the final structure of the front panels and the hood and how they’d all come together. With a bit of graph paper and some help from one of my kids as a 3D model, I basted together a version that didn’t work, but then logicked it out into a version that did work. There needs to be a line of squares that runs pretty much from the bottom of one side panel, up and over the hood, and down the other side panel. That’s two of the hood’s width of squares, and the other two join at the neck in the centre of the back panel. So across the back panel at the shoulders, two squares join to the front on the left shoulder, one opens to the front of the left side hood loop running down the front while the back two centre join the back of the hood, then the back and front join for two squares on the right shoulder, and the final square links the hood and right front panel. The hood itself is 12 squares in three rows of four and the corners fold in and down to be seamed the length of two squares across the top of the head.

Now the final structure is locked and the final squares laid out. Just need to join the final 25 or so squares, do the rest of the weaving in of ends, run some sc around all the edges and we should be at the finish line! The most magical bit? Even though I changed the structure several times, I have exactly one surplus square from the original design. And of course I will turn it into a pocket. <3

11-04-2022

Holy shit, I actually made a cardigan! Finished joining the squares and tried it on and holy shit not only is it a cardigan but IT FITS! That was two days ago. Since then I’ve been tinkering with edging. Tried sc in sunny all around and then sc in sunny with a dc in mocha but didn’t like either of those. In the end, did dc in mocha up one side, around the hood and down. Then I followed with sc in guava (coral) up around the hood and down, and continued with dc in guava across the bottom hem. Tried a dc border on the sleeve cuff in neptune but didn’t like it, so will do with a simple mocha dc cuff, weave in some errant ends from joining, add my pocket and be DONE!

Final counts: each sleeve is four squares wide (joined) and five squares long. The sleeve is generous and drapes a bit but very comfortable. Each front side panel is 3 wide by 6 long and the top front square on each side attaches to the hood, while the outer two attach to the back over the shoulders. The back panel is 6 by 6 squares, and the hood is 12 squares - three rows of four. That’s 116 squares plus one square for a pocket! For reference, I would normally wear a L to XL sweater - I’m busty and like a lot of positive ease in my sweaters.

13-04-2022

Aaaaaand done! Took a bit to finish the trim and weave in the last of the ends, but it’s done! I had one lonely square left, so I used a blanket stitch to turn it into a pocket. I seriously cannot believe I made this highly improbable sweater. It should not have worked - but it did!