New Raglan Sleeves

Some of you may know that I have a designers page on Ravelry and occasionally I take a look at who has made what from my designs. Well, to my surprise, a knitter Ravelry-nicknamed Londasneller devised a great improvement on my design and here it is. A raglan sleeve! I loved it and wanted to know how she did it so I could do the same. She began at the wrist, and found that increases took her to up to the armpit, where decreases could be made for the sleeve cap. 

This may be all gibberish to non-knitters, but I know some of you are paying attention, so for you very few, here's what I did with her directions.

 I made a mess. 

Three sleeve versions before I got it right. Here are versions 1 and 3, stacked. I decided not to start at the wrist but at the sleeve cap and increase to the armpit.  Then I decreased regularly to the wrist, but not correctly at first or at second try, but by the third try I got it right. 

 The first sleeve was way too wide and would have looked awful. The real problem was that it used up too much yarn and I began to run out when I was doing the second sleeve. So I unraveled sleeve #2 up to the armpit and decreased sharply as I traveled down the arm. Much narrower sleeve and I had just enough yarn to finish it perfectly. Now of course, I will unravel sleeve number one and repeat the decreases as I have marked on sleeve number 3. 

 I have markers at each ridge to note a decrease. For the record, I began at the neck by casting on 3 stitches and increased every right side row until I reached 75 stitches, which corresponds to the number of rows of the side of the diamond it would be attached to. My base diamond begins with casting on 75 stitches. After reaching my 75 stitches on the sleeve cap, I began to decrease each right side row (each edge) until I reached 67 stitches, which is where I could stop that acute decreasing and begin a less frequent decreasing. Next I decreased every other ridge until I reached 63 stitches. From that point on, I decreased only every fourth ridge onward to the wrist, ending with 39 stitches, and a length of about 18 inches from the armpit.

 As you can see it will line up nicely with the front and back. So much nicer than my original design, thanks to Londa!

 Here's the correct sleeve folded and placed where it will be sewn into the body of the jacket.

So I am one happy knitter and will encourage future jackets to be made with raglan sleeves, as it really improves the design immensely.