Saturday, July 3, 2010

Next time trust the math

Friday I had a couple of free hours so I sat down to knit the buttonhole row on my CPH. I got out my copy of this nifty book my mom gave me for Christmas because it has a handy chart for calculating the placement of the holes and my print out of one-row buttonhole instructions. Next I carefully calculated the placement of the holes:

1. Calculate the # of sts used for the holes: 4 sts x 5 buttons = 20sts

2. Deduct this from the total # of sts in the band: 138-20 = 118

3. Deduct sts above the top and bottom hole (I had the collar sts to account for so top was 24 sts and bottom was 6 sts): 118-30 = 88

4. Divide the remaining sts to fill the spaces between the holes (5 buttons = 4 spaces): 88/4 = 22

Per the instructions I started at the bottom of the band and after making the first hole, knitting the sts in between the holes then I thought I'd better check and see if I was going to end up at the right place for the last hole. I was worried it might end up smack in the middle of the collar. I measured and fretted and decided I had too many sts between the holes so I'd better go with less. For some unknown reason I went with 15 sts between holes. I could see going with 1 or 2 less but 7 less? I have no idea what I was thinking. But I carried on and ended up with 6 holes instead of 5 and it looked like this:





Not really the look I was going for - the buttons look too crammed together. So I ripped back to the sts after the first hole which was not fun as I had to unpick the cast -on/off sts around the holes and luckily I ended up with same # of sts as when I started. I did some more calculations and measuring based on the row I just did and I ended up with wait for it..... 22 sts between the holes! This is how it looks now - much better:


Click to enlarge

Der... next time I'll go by the chart!

2 comments:

  1. Yep, sometimes you just have to trust the pattern . . .

    I like it with less buttons, too!

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  2. those buttons are great with that yarn! i foresee math headaches for me too, when i make that pattern. maybe i'll just learn from your experience. :) that would not be like me, to benefit from someone else's hard-won lessons. i seem to have to make all the mistakes myself.

    it's really looking beautiful, and inspiring me to move it higher up in my queue...

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