Sunday, April 15, 2007

Sleeve help?

Hi fellow Ivy knitters!

I'm looking for help, advice, comments, whatever on sleeves.
I have fairly long arms (I'm 5'10") and most sleeves aren't long enough for me.
So, I'm sure I need to add some length to the sleeves, but I've never done this before! How do I measure my arm to make sure I get it the right length? Do I measure right from my armpit to my wrist? Should I just kind of hold my almost-long-enough knitted sleeve up to my arm and see when it looks long enough? Besides the length from wrist to armpit, do I need to adjust anything in the sleeve cap?

Any suggestions would be helpful!

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Looking at the pattern, the main measurement is from the underarm to wrist. So I'd suggest checking your measurement against that, and putting some extra rows in between the ribbing and the underarm.

Glenna also suggest some general modification ideas here: http://crazyknittinglady.wordpress.com/2007/02/21/potential-ivy-modifications/

7:34 AM  
Blogger Jo028 said...

I'm 5'9" & also have long arms, but I found these to be too long. I worked until 18", but shortened the cap a little. Going by the pattern, the sleeve about 25" from the shoulder. My total sleeves are 23.5" & is just how I like them!

5:27 AM  
Blogger Malia said...

I measured my arm last night and it looks like I should make the sleeve length from armpit to wrist almost 21 inches long. That sounds really long to me... but maybe that's just because i've never had sleeves that were actually long enough!

10:20 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm 6'0" and one of the joys of knitting is the prospect of sleeves that actually cover my wrists. I've finished all the knitting pieces on Ivy, but haven't blocked and sewn yet, due to some home construction taking away my blocking space. I can't remember exactly how long my arms were, but it might have been about 22" from armpit to the end. I usually leave sleeve shapping alone and add additional straight rows between the end of the shaping and the beginning of the armpit, which is what I did for Ivy. You can see that this would work out differently depending on if you do top down or bottom up. If I were pickier, I might try to space out the sleeve shaping as well. I measure from armpit to where I want it (usually the little bone under your thumb and above your wrist), but keep in mind that you never actually hold your arms straight. So I usually add a bit in my mind and then check along the way by holding it up. Good luck!

BTW this is Gwyn, a fellow KALer. I can't seem to log into Blogger so I'm doing the anonymous thing.

1:12 PM  
Blogger Malia said...

Soooo I knit the sleeves and put everything together and I'm working on the very last tie. Yes, i probably should've tried it on sooner, so the sleeves are, of course, too long. They seemed perfect before I connected them to the sweater! BOO! I'm a bad measurer I guess. Oh well. You live and you learn. I'm not taking it apart, so I either get to wear a sweater with looong sleeves (maybe 3 inches longer than they should've been) or i get a sweater with cute turned-up cuffs!

I'll post a picture soon...

9:36 AM  

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