Great Scrap busting cardigan

Positives:

Great basic cardigan pattern. Nice pictures and instructions. The instruction book in the paper pattern is nicely printed and good quality.

The bound top stitched edge on the front edge is really neat, and makes the finished product look great when worn with snaps undone.

This is a great pattern to practice sewing with knits. The small pattern pieces mean it’s low investment in materials, and has helped me gain more confidence using knits to make adult sized knit clothes.

I will use this pattern for years as my daughter grows. I’m going to try a cotton fleece fabric next

What I did:

I made a size 9-12 months using Merino knit jersey scraps from another project. I did colour blocking to suit the amount of fabric I had. I adjusted the number of snaps on the pattern for aesthetics with the colour blocking; and used plain gun metal grey cap snaps.

For me make time was about 3 hours (intermediate to experienced sewer), plus pattern tracing time as I wanted to save the original for future larger size makes.

I used an 18mm cutting wheel (~3/4 inch), pattern paper weights (random objects), and a medium to large size cutting mat, and fine point scissors for pattern cutting. This sped up the cutting time, while working with the small pattern pieces.

Tips:

• Lots of the pieces are symmetrical, so need to pay attention to the right and wrong sides of the fabric. I’d suggest double checking the right / wrong sides when pinning, to avoid mismatching right & wrong sides.
• if stitching on a sewing machine, I’d suggest testing out and choosing edge finishes and different stitch patterns for seams suitable for the fabric you’re using and your personal preference. Particularly for the neck band, as this seam can show at times when undone.