How toTuesday: Ruffles

Been awhile since I did one of these "how to's" !

A few weeks ago I showed a sneak peek of a pair of shorties I was making for Leah's wee girl. Leah came to stay with me in the weekend (yay!) so I gave them to her and now I can show you. As requested by Neak, here are the instructions for a vintage inspired ruffle.


Vintage Inspired Frilly Knickers



Pattern: Pimp my Longies. Size XL
Mods: Ruffle added to derrière and to hem of legs. The only other mod was to add a purl row where the waist band folds over which I think gives a really nice edge and makes it easier to fold over when you pick up the stitches.
Yarn: The Wool Company - Flamingo . Approx 120?g (my scales are broken so thats a guess)

I loved this pattern. The gusset is great and I thought it was a really nice fit on both M1 and N3 (who weigh 12ishkg and 15?ish kg). The waistband needs elastic which I've left for Leah to do to fit her DD. I'll definitely be making PMLongies again (and feel a bit dumb it has taken me this long to try Jenny's great pattern!!)

So the ruffle........

Leah said she wanted a surprise so I decided to try something completely different. I'm not sure how I decided on frilly knickers but I thought they would be something fun and girlie to try.



The ruffle formula I used is here.

Row 1 (RS): P2, *K10, P2. Repeat from * across.
Row 2: K2, *P10, K2. Repeat from * across.
Row 3: P2, *SSK, K6, K2tog, P2. Repeat from * across.
Row 4: K2, *P8, K2. Repeat from * across.
Row 5: P2, *SSK, K4, K2tog, P2. Repeat from * across.
Row 6: K2, *P6, K2. Repeat from * across.
Row 7: P2, *SSK, K2, K2tog, P2. Repeat from * across.
Row 8: K2, *P4, K2. Repeat from * across.
Row 9: P2, *SSK, K2tog, P2. Repeat from * across.
Row 10: K2, *P2, K2. Repeat from * across.
Continue in Stockinette Stitch for the rest of the piece.

So the instructions on the site/ as above are written for knitting flat starting from the CO edge - e.g you are knitting the ruffle THEN up the arm (or leg or whatever)



Obviously when I did the ruffle on the leg I was knitting in the round doing the leg THEN the ruffle so had to adapt the ruffle as follows

In the round - leg ruffle:
Row 1: P2 *K2 P2 . Rep from * across (if you need to, adjust the number of stitches on this row so the formula fits - hide a K2tog etc on the inside leg)
Row 2: P2 *Kfb Kfb P2. Rep from * across
Row 3: P2 *K4 P2. Rep from * across
Row 4: P2 * Kfb K2 Kfb P2 . Rep from * across
Row 5: P2 * K6 P2. Rep from * across
Row 6: P2 *Kfb K4 Kfb P2. Rep from *across
Row 7: P2* K8 P2. Rep from * across
Row 8: P2* Kfb K6 Kfb. Rep from * across
Row 9: P2* k10 P2. Rep from * across
Row 10: P2* K10 P2. Rep from * across
BO


Hopefully there are no errors there but if you find one let me know! Basically the first round is a set up round. After that on every 2nd round you inc into the first and last stitch of each knit section. There is always a column of 2 purl stitches between each section of knit stitches - these knit sections gradually get wider and become 'wedges'.



On the derrière I added 2 rows of ruffle. This time I was knitting flat so I adapted the ruffle again.

Knitting flat - derrière ruffle:

CO desired number of stitches. Silly me forgot to write this down but I *think* the top row was around 30 and the bottom row was more like 40 or 50. This is an XL size so if you are doing smaller longies then just CO less.

Row 1: K2 *P2 K2. Rep from * across
Row 2: P2 *Kfb Kfb P2. Rep from * across
Row 3: K2 *P4 K2. Rep from * across
Row 4: P2 * Kfb K2 Kfb P2 . Rep from * across
Row 5: K2 * P6 K2. Rep from * across
Row 6: P2 *Kfb K4 Kfb P2. Rep from *across
Row 7: K2* P8 K2. Rep from * across
Row 8: P2* Kfb K6 Kfb. Rep from * across
Row 9: K2* P10 K2. Rep from * across
Row 10: P2* K10 P2. Rep from * across
BO

When you are knitting flat on the wrong side you will be purling the wedges and they are separated by columns of 2 knit stitches.

I then slip stitched these onto the back of the shorties, roughly placing them so they started/finished where the short rows were. The longer 2nd row I placed so it 'curled' up around the shorter row and slip stitched the sides of it in place also. The top ruffle is about an inch from the bottom of the waistband.

Happy ruffle knitting!