tutorial Archives - Page 9 of 20

tutorial – working the Old Norwegian or Twisted German cast-on

You may have heard of the Old Norwegian or Twisted German cast-on method; it’s a variation of the long tail cast-on that is somewhat stretchier. The extra stretch is because of a few extra steps and an extra twist when making it. This, in turn, makes it much better suited for things like top-down socks, and cuffs of mittens and gloves.

And, like the long tail cast-on, it has the challenge of guesstimating the current length for your yarn tail. If you run out of tail, there are no more stitches that can be cast on. Since this cast-on requires a tad more yarn than the regular long tail cast-on, I would suggest leaving a yarn tail that is 4 to 5 times instead of 3 to 4 times as long as the width you want your work to become.

Let’s go ahead and see how this cast-on is done!

Materials used

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color 155 Vintage Pink.

Needles: * KnitPro Zing Fixed Circular Needles. In this tutorial, I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working the Old Norwegian or Twisted German cast-on step by step

Let’s get started on working this Old Norwegian or Twisted German cast-on!

Start by making a slip knot.
Place the slip knot on the right-hand needle.
Next, place your left thumb and index finger between the strands as shown while you hold the ends of both strands of yarn in your left hand with your other fingers.
This is the same as for a regular long tail cast-on.
Now rotate your left-hand upwards, while moving your right hand down, to dip the tip of the needle underneath both strands of yarn you see going around the thumb.
In other words: move the tip of the needle from left to right underneath both strands of yarn.
Next, move the needle tip over the strand at the right (top) and down into the loop at the thumb.
In this step you see how it looks after I’ve pulled the needle tip down into the loop and rotated my thumb upwards a bit.
When moving the needle tip upwards again it looks like this.
See how the yarn around the thumb is now twisted into an “x” shape?
Next, bring the needle over the top of the strand of yarn going around your index finger, and dip below it from right to left.
Now we’ve caught this strand too, it’s time for the next step.
Now we pull the last caught strand through the “thumb loop”, specifically through the gap of the x closest to your right hand.
Bending your thumb a bit can help to open up the x to more easily see where the needle tip should go.
This is how it looks after the strand has been pulled through.
To finish the new stitch, gently draw out your thumb from the loop …
… and tighten the stitch a bit by pulling on the strands.
Repeat steps 2 to 11 as often as needed to arrive at the desired number of stitches.
This is my result working the Old Norwegian or Twisted German cast-on:

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tutorial – working the long tail cast-on

The long tail cast-on method is one that is often used, because of the neat edge it makes. Also, it’s both firm and slightly elastic, making it quite suitable for a range of projects. It can be a bit tricky to get the hang of, but once you get the hang of it, it’s pretty fast to work.

The main challenge with this cast-on is that it uses its yarn tail together with the working yarn. In other words: if you don’t leave the tail long enough you may run short of yarn to cast-on all needed stitches. This is especially bothersome when casting on many stitches. A rule of thumb is to leave a yarn tail that is 3 to 4 times as long as the width you want your work to become. A somewhat more reliable guesstimate can be made by casting on 10 stitches, unravel those and leave a yarn tail in that length, multiplied as many times as needed to arrive at the number of required stitches. Plus a bit extra, of course, to weave in later on.

Another way to deal with it is not to calculate or guess anything, but just use 2 different strands of yarn. This can be from 2 different balls of yarn, or both ends of the same ball if you can find the end in the center.

Shall we go see how the cast-on is worked?

Materials used

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color Marine.

Needles: * KnitPro Zing Fixed Circular Needles. In this tutorial, I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working the long tail cast-on step by step

Let’s get started on this long tail cast-on!

Start by making a slip knot.
Place the slip knot on the right-hand needle.
Next, place your left thumb and index finger between the strands as shown while you hold the ends of both strands of yarn in your left hand with your other fingers.
Just try it, it’s really less tricky than it sounds!
In this next picture I’ve rotated my left-hand upwards, while moving my right hand down.
Doing this, the yarn basically makes a “v” between my thumb and index finger, making it possible to dip the tip of the needle underneath the strand of yarn you see going around my thumb.
Here I’ve caught that strand by passing the needle under the yarn that goes around my thumb.
Next, bring the needle over the top of the strand of yarn going around your index finger, and dip below it from right to left.
Now we’ve caught this strand too, it’s time for the next step.
Now we pull the last caught strand through the “thumb loop”.
This picture shows this step pretty well.
To finish the new stitch, gently draw out your thumb from the loop …
… and tighten the stitch a bit by pulling on the strands.
Repeat steps 2 to 8 as often as needed to arrive at the desired number of stitches.
This is my result working the long tail cast-on:

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tutorial – working a purl 1 below (p1b)

Tutorial on working a purl 1 below (p1b)

There are cases in which skipping the row on your needle for particular stitches is desired, and one is to knit or purl in the row below that one. In other words: you knit/purl into the stitch below where you normally would, exactly as the name suggests. Think, for example, off Fisherman’s Rib, but also off the bunny ears yo stitch, on its following wrong-side row.

The challenge in working this stitch is recognizing the stitch to insert your needle in. So that’s what I’ll be showing you in this tutorial. I’ll be using the same project I also used for the bunny ears yo tutorial, so please don’t be alarmed by all the lace. The p1b stitch in itself does not involve any lace knitting. To show you the difference between using a regular purl and a p1b stitch in bunny ear yo lace, take a look below:

bunny ears yo without p1b — With regular p

See how they differ? In the one on the left there is a horizontal thread over the yo part of the stitch. In the picture on the right the new stitch is made catching that horizontal thread too and thus keeping the yarn over open!

Materials used

Yarn: Nuna by Mirasol Yarn (40% merino, 40% silk, 20% rayon from bamboo; 175 m (191 yds) / 50 g), here in the color 1046 Coral.

Needles: To be honest, I don’t recall what the brand is of the needles I used in this tutorial. I do know I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working a p1b step by step

In patterns, you may encounter the following description of this stitch:
Purl 1 below (p1b): Purl into the stitch 1 row below the one on the needle by inserting the needle from back to front. Purl this stitch, then pull the worked stitch and the stitch above off the needle together.
But how to actually do this? Read on!

First, work your way across the row until you’ve reached the point where you want to make the stitch.
See that first stitch on the left-hand needle? That’s the yo in the middle of the bey stitch where I’ll be making the p1b stitch.
Insert the right-hand needle purl wise
Normally, you’d insert the needle directly into the loop that’s on the left-hand needle. However, in this case we want to insert the needle into the stitch below that one.
Now wrap your working yarn around the needle and pull it through.
See that you’re actually pulling it through 2 stitches at once? That is, the one on the needle and the one directly below it. To finish the stitch just slip the top stitch off the left-hand needle without actually working it. Because the fabric is secured by purling into the stitch below it, the stitch won’t run down unraveling.
The below picture shows how it looks on the purl side of the fabric after I’ve worked a regular purl stitch in the 3rd and last stitch of the bey.
You can see the 2 strands that are caught by the p1b pretty well.
Turning the fabric around, this is how it looks on the right (knit) side of the fabric.
I really like how it looks!

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tutorial – working the bunny ears yo stitch

In this tutorial I’m going to show you a stitch that I’m using in a new design: the bunny ears yarn over stitch, or “bey” for short. It uses a bunny ears decrease combined with a yarn over. Now, you may wonder what a bunny ears decrease is. I’ll tell you! It’s a symmetrical way of decreasing 3 stitches to only 2! I’ll be making a tutorial on this decrease and it’s variations soon.

Back to the bunny ears yo stitch. In this stitch a yarn over is placed between both parts of the decrease, essentially negating the decrease. Adding the yo in between both parts of the decrease make it look like 2 directional decreases on both sides of a yo, but without actually increasing or decreasing anything. The result is a very pretty stitch that does wonderfully in lace patterning as pictured here. Let’s get started with how to actually work this stitch!

Materials used

Yarn: Nuna by Mirasol Yarn (40% merino, 40% silk, 20% rayon from bamboo; 175 m (191 yds) / 50 g), here in the color 1046 Coral.

Needles: To be honest, I don’t recall what the brand is of the needles I used in this tutorial. I do know I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working the bunny ears yo stitch step by step

In patterns, you may encounter the following description of this stitch:
Bunny ears yo (bey): Knit 2 stitches together but leave the second stitch on the left needle, yo, next work skp over the next 2 stitches.
But how to actually do this? Read on!

First, work your way across the row until you’ve reached the point where you want to make the stitch.
See those 3 stitches on the left-hand needle? That’s where I’ll be making the bey stitch.
Next, insert the tip of the right-hand needle into the first 2 stitches at the same time as if to knit.
Over these stitches, we’ll be doing the first steps of a k2tog.
Wrap the yarn around the needle…
… and pull the yarn through the 2 stitches.
Next, slide only 1 of the 2 original stitches of the left-hand needle.
With a regular k2tog, both stitches would be moved off the needle. So this is where it starts to go different.
Next, wrap the yarn around the needle.
This is where we make the “yarn over” part of the stitch.
Now we’re starting the left leaning decrease part of the stitch.
This we’ll be working on the 2 remaining stitches on the left-hand needle: 1 stitch we haven’t handled yet, and 1 stitch that we didn’t move off the needle when working the k2tog right-leaning decrease. This part of the stitch can be worked both as ssk and skp, but since I personally prefer skp I’ll be showing this in the tutorial.

To start insert the tip of the right-hand needle into the first stitch as if to knit …
… and slip it onto the right-hand needle without actually knitting it.
This is how it then looks:
Next, we are going to knit the second stitch.
To do so, we start with inserting the right-hand needle into the first stitch on the other needle as shown below.
Wrap the yarn around the needle…
. …pull it through the stitch you inserted the right-hand needle in…
…and slip the original stitch off the left-hand needle.
Next, insert the left-hand needle into the second stitch counted from the tip of the right-hand needle…
… after that, pull it over the first stitch from the tip of the right-hand needle to complete the decrease.
Do you see how it slants to the left? With this the bunny ears yarn over stitch itself is finished. But, for optimal results, we’re not done yet. Take a look at the next section to see why.

Working the WS row after the bey row

After working a row where bunny ear yo’s are worked there, of course, also follows a wrong side purl row. However, when working regular purl stitches over the bey stitches, this creates a horizontal thread over the yo part of the stitch. This is, of course, no problem if you like how this looks. You can see this below on the left. But, if you prefer the bey stitch to really look like a big yo, flanked by directional decreases, we really have to do something different from a regular purl stitch. The solution is working a purl 1 below or p1b instead. This gives the result as shown on the right:

Please note that the picture on the left was right at the beginning of my project, in the set-up section. The other one was further on in the body of the project, hence the difference in surrounding fabric.

A tutorial for the purl 1 below or p1b will follow soon!

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tutorial – working a p2tog tbl

Tutorial on working the p2tog tbl decrease

Last time I showed you how to do a decrease worked on the wrong side of the fabric, that looks like a k2tog right leaning decrease on the right side: p2tog. In this tutorial it’s time to focus on the left leaning equivalent. In other words: a decrease worked on the wrong side, that looks like a skp or ssk left leaning decrease on the right side of the fabric. This is the “purl 2 stitches together through the back loop” decrease, or “p2tog tbl” for short.

Below I’ll show you how to work this decrease step by step.

Materials

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color 128 Lime Green.

Needles: * KnitPro Zing Fixed Circular Needles. In this tutorial, I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working a p2tog tbl step by step

Work your way across the row until you’ve reached the point where you want to make the decrease
In this case, I want to work the decrease 4 stitches in from the left side of the swatch.
Pull down the fabric below the 2 stitches you’ll be working the decrease on
This will make it easier to both see where to insert the needle and to actually insert it.
Insert the needle
Now insert the needle from left to right through the back loop of the first two stitches on the left-hand needle.
Wrap the working yarn around the right-hand needle …
… and pull the yarn through the two stitches
To finish the decrease slip the two stitches worked of the needle.
This is how this then looks.
The result
When viewed from the right side of the fabric, this decrease looks exactly look a skp!

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tutorial – working a p2tog

In a previous post, I already showed you how to work the right-leaning decrease, in which 2 stitches are reduced to one: the one abbreviated with “k2tog”. This stands for “knit 2 stitches together”. It’s a very easy and very common way to reduce the number of stitches in your project and make it narrower. It’s also often used in lace knitting.

But what when your lace also requires decreases to be worked on the wrong side of the fabric? This is where the purled decrease p2tog comes in! This decrease is worked on the wrong side and looks just like a k2tog when the result is viewed on the right side of the fabric. It’s a pretty straight-forward decrease to work; purl 2 stitches together, to decrease the total number of stitches by one. It is just like making a regular purl stitch but you work through two stitches instead of one.

Below you can find how to work this decrease step by step, so get your materials and follow along!

Materials

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color 128 Lime Green.

Needles: * KnitPro Zing Fixed Circular Needles. In this tutorial, I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working a p2tog step by step

Work your way across the row until you’ve reached the point where you want to make the decrease.
In this case, I want to work the decrease 4 stitches in from the right side of the swatch.
Insert the needle
Now insert the needle purl wise through the first two stitches on the left-hand needle and wrap the working yarn around the right-hand needle.
Pull the yarn through the two stitches…
… and slip the two stitches worked of the needle to complete the decrease
The result
When viewed from the right side of the fabric, this decrease looks exactly look a k2tog!

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tutorial – changing a k2tog to a skp

This tutorial is part of the series on fixing mistakes in knitting. When knitting lace or shaping in garments it can easily happen that a left-leaning decrease is worked where a right-leaning one was needed. Or vice versa, of course. And because I really don’t like ripping out my work, I’m showing how to drop down several rows in your knitting and change a k2tog to a skp.

Materials used

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color 142 Tea Rose.

A crochet hook in the same size or slightly smaller than your knitting needles. For example this * Pony Aluminum Crochet Hook in size 4 mm.

Changing a k2tog to a skp step by step

First, slip the stitches purl-wise from the left-hand needle to the right-hand needle, until you reach the stitch directly above the wrongly worked decrease.
Do you see it, 4 stitches below the needle?
Drop down the stitch.
Ladder it all the way down until the decrease is undone and you have 2 stitches instead of 1. Catch these 2 stitches with the crochet hook, from right to left.
Starting the skp decrease
To do so, insert the crochet hook below the first horizontal thread running directly above the 2 stitches on the hook.
Next, pull the horizontal thread through the first stitch on the hook.
This completes the “knit” part of the “slip 1, knit 1, pass slipped stitch over” sequence that makes up a skp.
Completing the skp
To finish the left leaning decrease, we now pull the second loop on the crochet over the first one.
Finishing up
Next, ladder your way up again by inserting the crochet hook underneath the horizontal thread directly above the hook, and pulling the thread through the loop already on the hook to make a new knit stitch. Repeat this until all horizontal threads have been worked. After this you can place the stitch back unto the knitting needle.

And that is how you go about changing a k2tog to a skp, several rows down in your knitting! I prefer knitting skp instead of ssk for my left leaning decreases, but the same principles apply to that too:

Just drop down the stitch directly above the decrease
Catch the stitches
Work the correct decrease using the first horizontal thread above the stitches as your working yarn
Ladder your way back up again.

That’s all there is to it!

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Working a m2 aka double m1 increase

There are various ways of working a double increase. Take for example a double yarn over. In this tutorial I will focus on the make 2 increase or m2 for short. It can also be referred to as a “double make 1” (m1) increase. It basically consists of working 2 m1 increases directly after one other in the same strand of yarn between 2 stitches in the row directly below the one you’re currently working.

The m1 increase is a directional one. This means that there is a left leaning version (m1l) and a right leaning version (m1r). The m2 version that consists of first working a m1r, followed by a m1l, makes a very decorative horizontal strand in the fabric. This is the version I’ll show you below. Different looks can be achieved by first working a m1l, followed by a m1r, working m1r twice, or a m1l twice. Experiment and choose the one that gives the look you like for a particular project!

Please do note, that since this increase uses the strand of yarn already there between stitches, it tends to tighten up the knitting. For this reason I advise to work one or more plain rows between increase rows, especially when stacking them.

Materials used

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color 128 Lime Green.

Needles: * KnitPro Zing Fixed Circular Needles. In this tutorial, I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Working a m2 increase step by step

First take your knitting. Here I’ve continued with the little swatch I used with a previous tutorial.
Knit to the spot where you want to make the increase.
First, work your way across the row until you’ve reached the point where you want to make the increase. In this case, I will be making the M2 increase 5 stitches in from the left edge. I’d make the increase in the middle of my swatch for a truly centered result, but alas, my swatch has an odd number of stitches.
First we start the m1r increase
To do so, lift the thread between the stitch just knit and the next one from the back with your left needle.
Insert the right-hand knitting needle into the front of the loop.
Wrap the yarn around the needle…
… and pull in through, slide the stitch of the left-hand needle to complete the m1r part of this double increase.
Next, we’re going to tackle the m1l part of the increase.
To do so, lift the thread between the stitch just knit and the next one from the front with your left-hand needle.
Insert the right-hand knitting needle into the back of the loop.
Wrap the yarn around the needle…
… and pull in through, slide the stitch of the left-hand needle to complete the m1l part of this double increase.
This is how it looks after this increase has been worked in 3 RS rows.
Pretty, isn’t it? And that’s all there is to it!

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tutorial – joining yarn with a magic knot

There are many ways to join a new ball of yarn to your project, the magic knot is one of them. Personally I prefer to work a felted, braided or Russian join instead, but that’s just because I don’t like knots in my work. If done correctly, the join should not fail and leave a neat, nearly invisible connection between the old and the new yarn.

This join is basically 2 knots pulled tight, with the yarn ends trimmed of. Due to this, it’s less suited for the more fragile yarns: These may break when pulled to tighten. Very bulky yarns may leave a too big knot that can’t easily be hidden between the stitches or at the back of the work. So, other than that the magic knot join really is a viable option to connect two pieces of yarn.

Materials used

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the colors Tea Rose and Vintage Pink.

Making a magic knot step by step

Time to get this join started!

Take your pieces of yarn
Align the yarn from your project and from the new ball of yarn as pictured below.
Making the first knot, part a
In this step one of the yarn tails is turned over, then under the other yarn tail, followed by turning it under itslef to form a loop.
Making the first knot, part b
Next, fold the yarn tail over itself, and then underneath again to form a knot.
Tighten the knot a bit
This is how it looks after this:
Making the second knot, part a
Now we take the other yarn tail and fold it over, then under the other strand of yarn.
Making the second knot, part b
Next, fold the yarn tail over itself, and then underneath again to form a knot.
This is how it looks after the second knot has also been tightened a bit:
The magic step!
First tighten both knots a bit more, and then comes the fun part. Take both pieces of yarn and pull to slide the knots close to each other.
After pulling and tightening it should look something like this:
Removing the yarn ends
On this step, after making sure the connection is tight and snug, we snip away the yarn ends as close as possible to the knot. Take care not to accidentally cut the wrong piece of yarn!
The end result!

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tutorial – pick up and knit

Turquoise swatch on a blue knitting needle against a white background with the text "pick up and knit".

In an earlier tutorial I already showed you how to pick up stitches. But what is the difference between “pick up and knit” and “picking up stitches”? The main difference is that with “pick up and knit” new yarn is introduced to form new stitches. “Picking up stitches” is merely placing loops from an edge of the existing piece of knitting on a knitting needle.

Pick up and knit, like just picking up stitches, is a way to add knitting to an existing piece of fabric, independent of the original knitting direction. It can be used to create finished edges around necklines, button bands, etc.

Materials used

Yarn: * Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn, here in the color Marine.

Needles: * KnitPro Zing Fixed Circular Needles. In this tutorial, I used the 4 mm (US 6) size with a cable length of 80 cm (32 inches).

Planning your pick up rate

A stitch is usually wider than it’s tall: it has a different row gauge than stitch gauge. This has as a result that picking up stitches along vertical edges at a rate of 1:1 usually doesn’t give an optimal result. In other words: we have to plan in advance how often to pick up and knit the stitches to avoid puckering and ruffling in the newly added piece of knitting. For this it’s useful to divide the edge into sections, using stitch markers. The possible sections would be vertical edge, diagonal edge and horizontal edge. The latter would be picking up along a bind-off or cast-on edge, where every stitch in the edge equals a stitch to be picked up and knit.

For the vertical and diagonal edges, if no ratio is specified in your pattern, a rule of thumb is to pick up approx. two stitches for every three rows or three stitches for every four rows. It’s also possible to calculate the pick-up rate exactly. To do so, measure the gauge of your blocked piece or swatch and pick up the correct number of stitches per 10 cm/inches along the edge to match your stitch gauge.

Pick up and knit step by step

In this tutorial I’m going to show you how to pick up stitches from the bind-off edge of a piece of simple stockinette. For this I made a little swatch. Of course, you can also pick up stitches along a cast on or side edge. Some people prefer using a crochet hook to pick up and knit, but in this example I’m just using knitting needles. Time to get started!

Find the most right stitch on the edge
With picking up stitches we work from right to left, with the right side of the fabric facing. We start by finding the outer right stitch on the edge and insert the knitting needle underneath it. In this example I’m working on a bind-off edge and I’m inserting my needle underneath both legs of the v. You can, of course, pick up only one of the strands, but that will result in a looser, less tidy connection. When working on a vertical edge, insert your needle under both strands of the edge stitch.
Wrapping the working yarn around the needle
Next is to wrap your working yarn around the knitting needle (or crochet hook). Leave enough of a tail to weave it in later on. About 15 cm or 6 inches should be enough.
Pulling the yarn through
Now pull the yarn wrapped around the needle through the fabric to form a stitch.
Repeat steps 1-3
Now just repeat steps 1-3 starting at the next spot where you want to pick up and knit a stitch until the whole edge has been worked. The result will look something like this:

What about garter stitch?

Yes, you can also pick up and knit from a fabric in garter stitch, or any kind of stitch, actually. The nice thing of garter stitch is that it has those typical garter bumps or ridges. This makes it very easy to pick up and knit a stitch every other row, when working on a side/vertical edge. Just insert your needle underneath a loop of the ridge! In the picture below that’s exactly what I did.

Pick up and knit from a garter stitch edge

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