I knitted a shrug pattern a bit ago, and it turned out very nicely, but I wasn’t happy with how it looked on me, or the functionality of it.

The Shrug is often seen as a bridging item for beginning to intermediate knitters. An item for the “I’m tired of knitting scarves, hats and shawls etc.., but don’t feel like I’m up for a sweater yet”. It attracted me because I thought it would be easy mindless knitting for watching TV or visiting, and also a useful addition to my wardrobe.
It was a lot of knitting. The pattern I picked was all stockinette stitch. Whew….really long and boring. I would recommend picking one with a simple pattern to keep it interesting. And while it looked nice, I didn’t find it to be very useful, for myself. My husband called it my buttwarmer, and that is a good description of it.
It stayed open in the front, where I was cold, and bagged in the butt area, which I don't need to emphasize. I did like the shorter sleeves and  that it was large enough to put over another sweater, or large top.

Original Shrug                                 Laying it out after frogging               Adding the new bottom edge
After looking at it, and trying to decide if I was going to frog it. I had an idea to turn it sideways so that the sewn together edges would be the back and front bottom edges, pick up stitches at those edges and make it a little longer. (I used a seed stich here)  And steek a neck area. See end of post for some steeking info and video tutorials links. Hopefully this would give me the best of both garments, shrug vs poncho. Short arms, easy movement, yet warm and easy to toss on over other garments.

Inside of steek with neck ribbing       Neck stitches picked up                   Decrease at the sides                                                                                                                                   of   neck  ribbing
I started by just frogging the sides that were sewn together, to make the armholes. I looked at it, and since the sides were stockinette stitch it rolled. So I picked up stitches along the edge and did a seed stitch for about 2 inches on each side. I thought it could be a blanket if I decided to go no further. Went to bed to sleep on it.
Got up in the morning and decided to go for it, and cut the neck. I ran a zigzag stitch (with my sewing machine) around the entire area that I wanted to cut for the neck. Easy and fast, then I cut it and picked up stitches all around for the neck ribbing. It was incredibly easy. I used a needle two sizes smaller for the neck ribbing and did a k1p1. I marked the end stitch on both sides of the neck and then did a knit two together twice on either side of the marked stitch every other round to make sure it laid flat. (either purl 2 tog or knit 2 tog, depending on what stitch is needed in the ribbing pattern on the decrease stitches) The neck hole stretched & ended up larger than I anticipated, but it turned out ok.
I’m happy with how it came out and think it looks a little “Spaghetti Western” (Wiki link) I remember me and my Mom watching a lot of Clint Eastwood.

It was pretty easy and now I have the best aspects of the shrug with the ease of a poncho.
Steeking info
Blog articles below:TinCanKnits crochet steeking method (link)
SeeEunnyKnit, great article on steeking, this covers, everything about steeking that you need to know (link)
YouTube Videos below (steeking)
VeryPinkKnits crochet method steek (link)
Jjones209 shows how to steek with the sewn method (link)
Arnie and Carlos show the sewing machine method (link)
Arnie and Carlos have great videos to watch, you should check out more of their videos!