Fluffy black Novice Sweater

Written on 31 January 2025 Comments

Closeup of the sleeve with the body in the background

It’s cold and I needed a new jersey, and had enough black merino yarn from a previously unravelled project to knit one. Black is not a colour I would have chosen for myself, and I also didn’t like the fabric this yarn made – but this is what I had already, so I paired it with a strand of silk mohair for a softer feel and warmer/denser fabric.

Because it’s been a couple of years since I knit a sweater, I chose to make the Novice Sweater again by Petite Knit. It’s a very beginner-friendly pattern, and I’ve worn my first one very intensively over the years!

The merino yarn I used is superwash, which internet told me has a tendency to grow. I also tend to knit quite tightly – so although my current measurements put me in a size XS, I chose to follow the instructions for size S, and knit slightly shorter in the body and sleeves to compensate for my height and the expected yarn “growth”.

After polling Instagram friends via my stories, I also decided to knit a foldover turtleneck collar for extra snuggles. I prefer twisted 1x1 ribbing though, so the foldover collar meant I had to twist both knit and purl stitches, which was a bit annoying.

I used this project to learn some new-to-me techniques: stretchy Italian tubular cast on, a different way of picking up stitches at the underarm without making holes, and a stretchy Italian bind off.

Details

Pattern:

Novice Sweater, by Petite Knit

Size:

S, but with lengths knit shorter to allow for superwash “growth”

Modifications:

Foldover/turtleneck collar

Needles:

4.5mm circular for cast on
5.5mm for ribbing
6.0mm for the rest

Yarn:

10 balls of Drops Big Merino, in black
3.5 balls of Drops Kid-Silk, in black

Gauge:

5cm = 8 stitches / 11 rows

Dimensions

Measurements taken flat, after blocking (difference with pre-blocking measurements shown in parentheses).

Collar:

Width: 12cm (no change)
Length: 19cm (+2.5cm)

Yoke:

Length to underarm: 24cm (+3cm)

Body:

Width at underarm: 47cm (+2cm)
Width at hem: 41cm (+6cm)
Length from bottom of collar: 50cm (+5cm)
Length from underarm: 34cm (+5cm)

Sleeve:

Width: 17cm (+1cm) – actually shrank to 15cm, but stretched it out again
Length from underarm: 43cm (+5cm)
Cuff width: 7cm (no change)
Cuff length: 9cm (+1cm)

Project notes

12.01.2025

Did a quick swatch with 6mm needles + 2 strands held together (big merino + kid silk). Getting close enough gauge, but still decided to follow the S instructions because I tend to knit tightly.

Italian tubular cast on with 4.5mm needles, 60 stitches, twisted 1x1 ribbing with 5.5mm needles (using this cast on video tutorial).

Doing a folding turtleneck collar instead of the simple 8cm one, 13cm so far.

Sore thumbs, I’m clearly putting too much tension on my hands and my knitting.

13.01.2025

Almost done with the modified collar (fold over turtleneck). Will knit another 1-2cm tomorrow.

14.01.2025

The completed foldover turtleneck collar

Finished longer turtleneck collar on the black Novice sweater. Did the first round of increases, then knitted 5cm.

Wondering whether I should knit shorter because of the super wash wool….

15.01.2025

Worried the superwash merino will stretch out vertically even with the thread of silk mohair, so will wash and dry my swatch to measure growth/shrinkage.

before washing: 5x5cm = 11 rows 8 stitches
after washing: 5x5cm = 10.5 rows 7.5 stitches Only losing 1 row/stitch per 10cm, not too bad!

Finished 2nd round of yoke increases, almost ready for 3rd round. Used 80g (120m) of merino and 15g (126m) of kid silk so far.

Finished 3rd round of yoke increases. Wondering if it was a bad idea to make the bigger size, given that the superwash yarn grows 1 stitch / 10cm…

18.01.2025

Continued yoke and did 4th (last) round of increases.

19.01.2025

Finished 3rd ball of merino with yoke measuring 16cm. Finished 1st ball of kid silk a few rounds later, with yoke measuring 19-20cm.

Sleeves put to rest.

20.01.2025

Finished 4th ball of merino, yoke + body measures 24cm (armpit 2.5-3cm).

Finished 5th ball of merino before bed, yoke + body 29cm (armpit 9cm).

21.01.2025

Continued body during lunch, meetings, and before bed. Currently measures 34cm.

22.01.2025

Continued body after lunch, and tried on at ~36cm: looks good, feels super snuggly!

Ideal finished length will be ~49cm:

Default length for size XS is 54cm including 8cm ribbing.
My superwash yarn grows 1 row (1/2cm) per 10cm.
Will knit body 54cm -5cm for shorter length -2.5cm superwash growth = 46.5cm total.

Finished stockinette body at around 38cm, finished 5th ball of merino. Ready to knit 8cm ribbing to get to 46cm pre-blocking length, 49cm post-blocking length.

Started ribbing, did 3cm before bedtime.

23.01.2025

Knitted more ribbing.

24.01.2025

Finished 6th ball of merino. Finished the bottom ribbing.

Did an Italian bind off, but forgot to twist the knit stitches, so it’s not as clean as it might have been.

Closeup of the bind-off just started, with a video tutorial visible on an iPad in the background

View of the finished finished bind-off on the body ribbing

25.01.2025

Realized I accidentally finished the ribbing on the body with 6mm needles instead of 5.5mm.

Made 2 attempts to pick up underarm stitches and knit the sleeves: created holes at the corners both times (probably badly placed extra picked-up stitches). Realized my picked-up stitches were super wonky and decided to unravel, and broke another cable… 😭 Tried again once or twice and failed again. The cloudy weather is making it too dark to see my stitches with black wool, I can’t win today.

Tried over and over again to pick up stitches at the underarm without making holes. Unraveled about 4 times, but got it on the last attempt! Followed a different technique: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8K-IsMdTHK0 (no extra stitches made, but 2 bars on each side picked up and knitted twisted with the one next to it.

Spent a lot of time untangling yarn today, with the excessive unraveling.

A hot mess of tangled merino and mohair yarn

26.01.2025

Finished 7th ball merino, at 10cm of one sleeve. Usage so far:

merino 7 x 75m = 525m
mohair 2.32 x 210m = 487.2m

Finished 8th ball of merino while still on sleeve (23cm). Finished sleeve and cuff, ready to bind off. Will put on a lifeline first and try twisting the knit stitches to see if it looks better.

27.01.2025

This morning tried doing Italian bind off with twisted knit stitches, but that just created loopy untwisted edges. Luckily I only did about 10 stitches and kept my lifeline in, so I then spent 15 minutes undoing it 😩

Successfully did a normal Italian bind off at lunch.

Tried to pick up underarm stitches without gaps for the second sleeve: one side was ok, but the other side was definitely not. Guess I did it wrong… Tried to drop the incorrectly twisted bar and the stitch after it, to see if I could save it.

28.01.2025

Tried a few times to tighten up the underarm corners, not much success so far. Kept knitting about 2-3cm to finish the 9th ball of merino.

Neck reading/knitting lamp arrived and it’s not bad for 15€!

Finished the 10th small ball of merino (probably really part of the 9th) with 2nd sleeve at 13cm.

29.01.2025

Finished 3rd ball of kid silk with 2nd sleeve at 18cm. Finished 11th (10th?) ball of merino with sleeve at 35cm.

31.01.2025

Finally finished knitting the black Novice sweater at lunch! Finished weaving in ends during meetings.

Soaked and blocked at lunch time.

The finished sweater being worn before blocking

The sweater in a small tub of warm soapy water

02.02.2025

The sweater finally dried enough to photograph and wear it 😊

Love the final sweater, it’s soft and warm, and fits exactly as I’d planned (so it was a good idea to wash/dry/measure the swatch and adjust my knitting lengths accordingly).