Cumulus Blouse, My First V-Neck Sweater Knit

The reason I chose the Cumulus Blouse was the v-neck construction. I thought I would use a heavy yarn instead of the designer’s choice, but the pattern really wasn’t written for wool. I ended up with something a little different.

I’ve been dealing with being sick from Covid for about a month now (July 2022). Simple knitting is about all I’ve done while sitting in front of the television. Most days I couldn’t get off the couch and took a few naps off and on. I’ve been pretty miserable. I finished the Honey Cowl #3 and did a lot of round and round knitting on my orange watchcap. I even sat outside one morning and did a little knitting on the striped sweater which I eventually finished.

stranded knitting with red yarn — Knitting Cumulus

Now I am ready to begin a new sweater and I want a v-neck. My choice, in the end, was the Cumulus Blouse by PetiteKnit. I’ve been eyeing her sweaters on Instagram for a while now. They are very cute but she likes to knit holding two yarns together, and the Cumulus is no exception. It calls for two strands of Mohair type yarn held together and knit with a size 7 needle. I don’t plan to do that, so I have named my version the Cumulus Sweater.

Any time you must use two strands of yarn together in a sweater the cost of knitting that sweater doubles. Also, I am not a huge fan of Mohair fuzzies. I plan to use some Harrisville Highland wool I’ve had for a bit. Her little sweater is not something that would look good on my body either!

Cast-On Day

Today (July 6th) I did my cast-on and set up the raglan increases. The cast-on row ends up being the back of the neck area and then the increases are made to expand the shoulders and make the v-neck front. I’m not crazy about “make ones” and there are a lot of them in this pattern. Also, every other row is a purl row – so there’s that. That will change once the body is joined in the round.

I am also knitting from a cone for the first time. Cones generally save money because you get a lot of yarn for much less than a normal few skeins of yarn. I honestly can’t remember where I bought these cones, but I have two in this color as well as an extra normal skein. (I ended up using nearly all of both cones. Without using that red contrast color, I would have needed more than the cones to finish this sweater.)

I made a mistake right off the bat when the pattern said to set up the markers. I knit across the row to add ring markers when really I should have simply added attachable markers along the needles. So I had to purl back across and THEN begin the four row increases. Because of this, I have two extra rows of knitting.

I’ve looked through the entire Cumulus Blouse pattern and the designer calls for an i-cord bind-off with decreases. And then the neckline is done in an i-cord, but without the decreases. This was confusing. She directs knitters to her website with a Petite Knit videos page and after searching, found the i-cord bind off under the section “Tips and Tricks”. Once I watched the video (which is not in English) I realized that the decrease part of the bind-off is the k3 together part, so that will be left out when doing the bind-off around the neck. Great, I’m all set! (Actually, I did this differently with fewer stitches because my yarn was heavy.)

I do not plan on doing an i-cord bind-off for my body and sleeve cuffs as my yarn is not mohair. A normal ribbing will work fine – going down a needle size to a 6.

I am ready to continue on with my new sweater knitting project.

Now that I have done most of the V part, I am re-checking my gauge. My gauge is good. Onward!

Cumulus v-neck sweater knitting — Knitting the body after separating the sleeves

I finished off the neckline before I finished knitting the sweater. Because my yarn is stiffer, I only did a cast-on of 2 for the i-cord bind off, and knit from there with a k1, k2togtbl. Now I could try the sweater on to see the v-neck, and it is low. For this type of sweater, it doesn’t matter as I would have a shirt on underneath.

I’m not real happy about my neckline. It is puckering a bit and there is a tiny hole that I had to close up in the end. That is all on me and my lack of skills.

Colorwork in red yarn (Brooklyn Tweed Shelter – color “Long Johns”) was added along the bottom of the body. I went up to a size 8 needle for that. Then, I did the ribbing in size 7, but I wish I had used a 6. I may go back and redo that ribbing. (I did.)

One sleeve is done. I only did a total of 7 decreases down the sleeve. Used a size 8 to work the trees, then decreased for five rows doing k1, k2tog (BOR) and SSK, k1 at end of round, while knitting one brown and one red around.

Both the flowers and trees patterns came from Fair Isle books I have.

With 60 stitches I began the ribbing using size 6 DPNs and made the cuff long enough to roll up.

Re-doing the body ribbing

I have finished knitting the Cumulus sweater but have decided to rip out the body ribbing. It will be done over using a size 6 needle (originally it was knit in a size 7). I ended up adding a bit more red before the ribbing.

picking up stitches to rip back knitting — picking up stitches to rip out ribbing

First ribbing on body — picking up stitches to rip out ribbing

So the Cumulus sweater was officially done on September 8th. It took me almost exactly 2 months to knit – between knitting on other projects along the way. It has been washed and is drying in the spare bedroom. Then I will get a photo of me wearing it.

Drying my wool sweater in Florida on a spare bed

The pattern was very easy to follow and straight forward to knit, but I did not do the bind-offs the same as the pattern directions. I also did not hold two light weight yarns together.

My sweater is quite roomy and comfy. If I ever did knit this pattern using the type of yarn suggested, I would knit the Medium size – one size smaller. My gauge was correct, and I checked it twice.

You can buy the Cumulus Blouse pattern from PetiteKnit on her Ravelry page. It is very pretty when knit in light weight yarn, and if you have the body for it – go for it!