A perfect dog gift for Benga: I’ve already measured my dog, designed a pattern using Knitware Critters and picked out my yarn. I also knitted a gauge swatch.
My faithful friend
The yarn I bought at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival
02/28/2011 So, I’m about halfway done Benga’s dog sweater. I wanted to make a personalized dog gift just for her, so I decided to add a buttonhole so she could wear her harness under the sweater. Here’s how I did it….
I put her harness on her and measured where the hook of the harness fell. I found it to be around 7 inches from the collar. Thus, I figured I would have to put the buttonhole at around 7 inches from the collar. You can see the arm holes on both sides and the main piece in the center.
I am getting about 6.75 stitches per inch in my knitting. I wanted the buttonhole to be about 1.5 inches long. Therefore, I would need about 10 stitches in the buttonhole (6.75 x 1.5). There are 116 stitches in the center piece. I subtracted 10 stitches from the total center piece (116-10 = 106) and divided that by 2 (106/2 = 53) to get how many stitches on each side of the buttonhole to knit.
Just about halfway there!
Once I got to 53 stitches, I started my buttonhole. I made a one-row horizontal buttonhole described in the book, The Perfect Finish. There are so many helpful hints in that book! The book describes how to seam sweaters, place zippers, make pockets and much, much more. The instructions are clearly written and the photos are fantastic. I use it often and highly recommend buying it.
