tutorial Archives - Page 3 of 14

tutorial – raising the back neck of circular yoke sweaters

Circular yoke sweaters and tees are pretty popular. No wonder, because they are a great canvas for colorwork or lace. However, some shaping for raising the back neck is really necessary to make it sit right. Without any shaping, chances are that when it sits right at the back, it sits too high in the front, giving that undesired choking feeling. Likewise, if it sits well in the front, it will probably sit too low in the back. And no, this isn’t something that some rigorous blocking will fix.

In this tutorial, I’ll show you first what exactly the problem is. And, of course, also how to fix it.

The problem

As you can see in the below picture, the main issue is that the human torso is not symmetrical back to front. The neckline is angled, which means that to arrive at the same level, there is more fabric length needed in the back than at the front. And completely circular yokes (as well as raglan sweaters) without any added back neck shaping are symmetrical and don’t have this extra length built in.

As visualized in the below picture, you may start out with the situation on the right. However, as the day goes by, the sweater will want to return to its base shape and the neckline in the front will creep up as pictured on the left.

The solution, of course, is to add shaping to give the yoke the extra fabric it needs in the back. In ready-made garments, you also see a difference in the depth of the yoke in the back vs the front of the garment. That difference is called the “front neck drop”, which is in essence the same as raising the back neck by a certain distance. They both refer to a difference in vertical distance to create a better fit in your garment at the neck.

Flat lay picture of a t-shirt showing the front neck drop — Front neck drop

Adding a wedge to the back — Front neck drop

Raising the back neck: How?

The usual solution is to use short rows to add extra length over a certain number of the back stitches. These can be added close to the neckline, above any yoke patterning, below the yoke patterning to lengthen the back or a combination of these two. The short rows themselves can be of the wrap & turn kind, German short rows, or any other type of short row you prefer.

But this is not my preferred way….

Instead, I prefer to work back and forth over the back stitches only to lengthen that part. I do this directly before dividing the stitches for the body and sleeves. Let me you show what I mean:

A flatlay picture of a circular yoke, with a wedge knitted on.

A schematic of a circular yoke, with an added wedge.

This is my Jade Clover design when it was still in progress. This is a really easy way to raise the back neck, because no short row calculations are needed. Just look up in the pattern how many stitches you have for the back of your garment. Next, work those back and forth for a bit. This is a very easy way to include back neck shaping in patterns that don’t have it. Or, to raise it a bit further than the pattern describes. I know I have done so occasionally. For example, when only a few short rows were included, and the sweater still looked a bit choky on the models.

Below is my Shoreham-by-Sea tee pictured. You can see how that bit of knitting looks after the stitches are divided and a bit of the body has been worked.

What about the sleeves?

As you can see, there is now a vertical section between the held stitches and the stitches that were cast on for the underarm. And yes, this does mean that along that edge, stitches will also have to be picked up and knit for the sleeves. In my patterns where this technique is used, I have taken this into account when calculating all stitches and decrease rows for the sleeves. Take a look at the picture below to see how it looks when the garment was all done:

In sweaters where you add this yourself, you will start out with more sleeve stitches than the pattern describes. It may mean that you have some welcome extra ease in the upper arm. In that case, just follow the pattern for a larger size that has the same approx. number of sleeve stitches. If you want narrower sleeves, you may need to take an extra look at the number of decrease rounds and the number of plain rounds between them.

On a final note, I have not yet tried this technique with raglan garments. However, I strongly suspect it will work just as nicely there as it does with circular yoke sweaters. When I do try it, I will report back!

Thanks to my Patreon supporters for bringing you this freebie! Creating quality patterns and tutorials is a lot of work and resource-intensive. However, I find it important to give you free content like this tutorial. Thanks to the generous support of my Patreon supporters, I can make it happen. Thank you, patrons! Click here to join, or click here to read more about La Visch Designs on Patreon.

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tutorial – two-stitch buttonhole in 2×2 rib

Knitting neat buttonholes can be a challenge, especially if you need the bigger sized ones. They often tend to sag or stretch at the edges. Fortunately, I recently came across this lovely technique to make a two-stitch buttonhole, right in the purl portion of (k2, p2) rib patterning. This method may seem a tad involved, but trust me, the result is really worth it!

In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to work buttonholes in an 8 st repeat, with a buttonhole over the 2 stitches in every other purl section of the rib patterning.

Materials used

Yarn: Beiroa, an aran weight yarn from Retrosaria Pomar; a 100% Portuguese wool yarn, manufactured in Portugal, exclusively from the wool of free grazing Bordaleira Serra da Estrela sheep.

Knitting needles: A pair of Addi circular needles in size 4.5 mm (US7).

Knitting two-stitch buttonholes in 2×2 rib, step by step

This technique is worked over various rows. In a pattern (like the one for the cardigan-in-progress used in this tutorial), you can expect instructions like these:

Buttonhole row 1 (RS): *K1, kfb, (p1, psso) twice, sl st back to left needle, k2tog, k1, p2; rep from *.
Buttonhole row 2 (WS): *K2, p2, you have then reached the first bound off st, m1bl, p2; rep from *.
Buttonhole row 3 (RS): *K2, m1rp, p1, k2, p2; rep from *.

Let’s get started!

First, work to the 2 knit stitches just before the purl stitches where you want to place your buttonhole.
Knit 1 stitch.
In this step, work a kfb increase in the next stitch.
Now purl the next stitch on the needle….
… insert the tip of your left-hand needle into the second stitch on the right-hand needle ….
… and pass it over the purl stitch.
Repeat steps 4 to 6 once.
Next, slide the first stitch that’s on the right-hand needle back to your left-hand needle.
Next, knit the first 2 stitches on the left-hand needle together (k2tog), decrease the extra stitch away.
To finish the last few stitches of the repeat, work k1, p2 over the 3 next stitches.
Now you can repeat these steps until you have the correct number of buttonholes, and then continue with the button band until you’ve reached the end of the row. It can be useful to use stitch markers around the buttonhole repeats, to make it easier to find your place on the next row.
Buttonhole row 2: Work the button band on the WS until you’ve reached your marker. Then work k2, p2 over the next 4 stitches.
You have then reached the first bound off st.
Now work a m1bl increase.
Next, purl 2 stitches to finish the buttonhole repeat on the WS.
Again, continue and repeat as needed to the end of the row.
Buttonhole row 3: Work to the start of the buttonhole repeat and work k2 over the first 2 stitches.
As you can see in the result of the last step, we’ve now reached the newly cast-on stitch. To make sure the buttonhole edge is nice and tight, we’ve not cast on 2. But, of course, we do need two stitches in theta purl section. So, to remedy that, we’ll be using the extra slack in the loose thread of yarn to make that extra stitch. To do so, work a m1pr: a right leaning m1 stitch, worked purl-wise.
To finish the buttonhole, work a p1 in next stitch, followed by k2.

The result

Below, you can see the result of working this two-stitch buttonhole. Really neat, right?!

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tutorial – weaving in ends as you go (end of a color)

Weaving in ends is a thing that just happens in projects. I mean, every ball of yarn has a beginning and an end, and when it’s through when the project is not, a new one has to be attached. When working in a solid color, depending on the type of yarn, the Russian join, braided join or the felted join may be just what you’re looking for. However, if there are a lot of joins, because you’re, for example, working wide stripes in different colors, these usually are not the best option.

In this tutorial, I want to focus on how to deal with the yarn end of the old color, once a new yarn in a new color has been joined. For this method, you don’t need to tie knots, or even use a tapestry needle. And you can work it on the go, so that when you’re finished with the project, you’re also already finished with weaving in the ends. The downside is that this method is best to use in combination with feltable fibers. In other words: yarns that are somewhat “grabby” like wool and alpaca. Worked in ends with smoother yarns like silk and cotton may become undone.

Materials used

Yarn: Rauma Finull a sportweight wool yarn from Norway. It has a crisp hand and works well for stranded color designs. The yarn also softens up with washing.

Knitting needles: A pair of Addi circular needles in size 4 mm (US6).

Weaving in ends as you go, step by step

Let’s get started!

In the below picture, the new yarn has been carried along from the previous section in that color, using the technique described here.
Please note, that of the old color a yarn tail of approx. 10 cm (4 inches) has been left.
Next, insert your needle into the next stitch as if to knit.
In this step, take the bit of yarn tail and wrap it around the working yarn. It does not matter which way around you wrap, just do it consistently every time.
After this, work the rest of the stitch as usual.
Now work a stitch as usual according to your pattern. In this case, that’s a knit stitch.
Repeat steps 3 and 4 until no more length of yarn tail remains.

The result

Below, you can see the result of weaving in the ends as you go, when viewed from both the right, and the wrong side of the fabric. Really neat, right?!

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tutorial – working the knit 1 under loose strands (k1 uls) stitch

In some cases, loose strands of yarn in front of the work are used to make details in patterning. Take, for example, my Kitties all around hat. In this hat pattern, I use these loose strands to create the whiskers of the little cats. At some point, you need to catch these loose strands behind another stitch. This way, you make sure they’re fixed in the correct point in the patterning. This is where the knit 1 under loose strands (k1 uls) stitch comes in! Read on to see how it’s done.

Materials used

Yarn: Paintbox Yarns Simply DK, a good value, good quality 100% acrylic yarn. The yarn shown here is in the colors 155 Vintage Pink and 125 Spearmint Green.

Knitting needles: This is a pair of straights that I picked up at the second-hand store when I started knitting, brand unknown.

Working a k1 uls stitch step by step

In patterns, you may encounter the following description of this stitch:
Knit 1 under loose strands (k1 uls): Insert right-hand needle under the loose strands to slip the next stitch purlwise, pulling it out from under the loose strands before replacing it on the left-hand needle, trapping the strands behind the stitch, next knit it.

Alternatively, the stitch may be described like this:
Knit 1 under loose strands (k1 uls): Insert right-hand needle under the loose strands then into the stitch, wrap the yarn around the needle and pull it through underneath the loose strands, trapping them behind the stitch. Slide the stitch off the left-hand needle to complete the k1 uls.

Both methods amount to exactly the same, but have a slightly different way to achieve the end result. In this tutorial, I’ll show the second version.

Make sure you have your piece with knitting with loose strands to work, as instructed in your pattern.
In this swatch I have 2 strands, achieved by slipping 3 stitches purlwise, with the yarn held in front of the work.
First, work your way across the row until you’ve reached the point where you want to make the k1 uls stitch
In this case, I’m making it in the middle stitch of the 3 slipped ones.
Insert your right-hand needle underneath the loose strands to capture.
Now, insert the right-hand needle knit wise in the stitch to knit.
Here I want to make a regular knit stitch, but if you’re instructed to work it through the back loop (k1 tbl), insert the needle in the back loop instead.
To continue, wrap your working yarn around the needle…
…. and pull it through the stitch.
Next, also pull it from underneath the loose strands.
This is what captures the strands behind the newly made stitch.
Finally, finish the stitch by slipping the loop off the left-hand needle.

And that’s all there is to it!

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tutorial – weaving in ends as you go (start of a new color)

Therefor, I want to focus in this tutorial on a different method to join a new yarn in a new color. For this method, you don’t need to tie knots, or even use a tapestry needle. And you can work it on the go, so that when you’re finished with the project, you’re also already finished with weaving in the ends. The downside is that this method is best to use in combination with feltable fibers. In other words: yarns that are somewhat “grabby” like wool and alpaca. Worked in ends with smoother yarns like silk and cotton may become undone.

Let’s get started!

Materials used

Yarn: Rauma Finull a sportweight wool yarn from Norway. It has a crisp hand and works well for stranded color designs. The yarn also softens up with washing.

Knitting needles: A pair of Addi circular needles in size 4 mm (US6).

Weaving in ends as you go, step by step

To start, grab your new ball of yarn!

Making sure you leave a yarn tail of approx. 10 cm (4 inches), work the first stitch of the row as instructed, using the new color of yarn.
In this case, I worked a knit stitch.
Next, hold the yarn tail together with the working yarn and work approx. 4 to 5 stitches as instructed, with the yarn held double.
Here, you see the result after I worked those stitches and I have a little bit of yarn tail remaining.
After this, work the rest of the row as instructed in your pattern, and continue with the next (WS) row as well.
When you arrive at the double strands on the WS row, just work them as if they are a single strand of yarn.
In this picture, I’ve inserted the right-hand needle into the first stitch to purl it.
Once the row is finished, this is how it looks.
Please note, that I’ve worked the last stitch with the new color yarn held double with the old color, as explained in the tutorial about carrying yarn up the side.

The result

Below, you can see the result of when viewed from the right side of the fabric. All new colors started (except the darkest one, which has been carried up along the side), were woven in as explained above. As you can see, the few stitches with the yarn held double at the beginning of these rows do not have a significant impact on how it looks. It sure makes a difference in the amount of finishing to when the knitting is done, though!

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tutorial – working the M6 increase

With almost every new design, comes a new technique or stitch pattern. In the project pictured above, I’m working a stitch pattern that uses a “make 6” increase. It’s very much like a regular “make 1” but instead of picking up the strand between the 2 stitches and making 1 stitch out of it, 6 new stitches are made by working [k1, p1] 3 times in the same loop. So, of course, there has to be an accompanying tutorial to make sure there is no confusion about how to go about it.

Let’s get our materials and get started!

Materials used

Yarn: Rauma Finull a sportweight wool yarn from Norway. It has a crisp hand and works well for stranded color designs. The yarn also softens up with washing.

Knitting needles: A pair of Addi circular needles in size 4 mm (US6).

Working the M6 increase step by step

To start, work as instructed by your pattern until the point where you want to make the increase.

In this example, I shot the pictures with the M6 not quite in the correct place. No worries, though, I corrected it later on.
First, insert your right-hand needle from front to back underneath the strand of yarn between the stitch just worked, and the next one to work.
Place it on the left-hand needle as shown, with the stitch mounted with the right leg in front of the needle.
You can place it on the needle with a twisted stitch mount, with the left leg of the stitch in front of the needle. However, this would mean that you have to work the following steps though the back loop to make sure the hole created in the fabric is not closed up.
Next, insert the needle knitwise into the loop, wrap the yarn around the needle …
… and pull it through. Do not slip the loop off the needle yet!
Now, bring the yarn to the front of the work, insert the needle purlwise into the loop, wrap the yarn around the needle …
…and pull it through. Do not slip the loop off the needle yet!
Repeat steps 4 to 7 twice more, so that you have created 6 new stitches. You can now slip the loop of the left-hand needle.
On the next row, you can just work these new stitches as instructed in your pattern.

The result

Below, you can see the result. On the left, it’s shown directly after the M6 increase has been worked. On the right, the M6 increase is shown, incorporated in the patterning I’m working in this design. Pretty, right?!

How the M6 looks in the stitch pattern I'm working in this design

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tutorial – carrying yarn up the side

When working with different colors of yarn, for example when knitting stripes, it can be useful to carry up the unused yarn at the side of the work. This, of course, assumes you’re working on a project knitted flat back and forth. Carrying the yarn between rows, can help avoid a lot of cutting and weaving in ends. I don’t know about you, but that is not a favorite step of mine when finishing projects, so I try to avoid that where I can.

There are various ways of carrying yarn along the side of the work. In this tutorial, I’m focussing on the double strand method. In the basis, this means nothing more than working the last stitch of the row with both strands of yarn. You can also work the first stitch of the row with both strands together, this is purely a matter of preference. I’m used to the last stitch of the row, so that’s what I’ll be showing.

The main upside of this technique, when compared to just holding the yarn along the side, is that the tension is the same as the rest of the project. This way, there is absolutely no risk of holding the unused yarn at a too tight or too loose tension. It’s also very easy and fast to do. There are of course also downsides. Because the yarn is held double at that one stitch, it will bulk up that stitch. When working with thinner yarns, as I usually do, that’s often really no issue. However, if you’re working with thicker yarns, or with multiple colors, this may not be the ideal method.

Materials used

Yarn: Rauma Finull a sport weight wool yarn from Norway. It has a crisp hand and works well for stranded color designs. The yarn also softens up with washing.

Knitting needles: A pair of Addi circular needles in size 4 mm (US6).

Carrying yarn up the side step by step

To start, work as instructed by your pattern until you only have 1 stitch remaining in the row.
In the picture, you can see the working yarn (light) as well as the yarn to carry up (dark).
Now insert the right-hand needle into the stitch (here it’s to be knit) and wrap both strands of yarn around the needle.
Pull both strands of yarn through, and slip the stitch of the needle.
This is the result when viewed on the wrong side of the work.
Do you see that the first stitch of the row is now double-stranded?
Next, turn the work and insert the right-hand needle into the stitch (here it’s to be knit), taking care to insert in both strands and wrap the working yarn around the needle.
Pull the yarn through…
… and finish the stitch.

The result

Below, you can see the result of carrying the yarn up the side, using the double strand technique. You can see that the stitches in the light yarn on the right are a tad bulkier than the other stitches. That said, the yarn is thin enough that after blocking this won’t be much of an issue. Also, in this particular case, I’ll be picking up stitches along the side of the project for a border, so the edge stitch is also a selvage stitch ad won’t be visible at all in the end result.

The end result of carrying yarn up the side

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tutorial – casting on at the underarm for garments

When knitting a top-down garment like a sweater or a tee, there inevitably comes a moment where the stitches in the yoke are divided in those for the armholes and those for the body. Usually, the armhole stitches are put on a stitch holder or waste yarn. Next, the stitches for the back and front(s) are to be connected. Of course, you could just knit straight from the one set of stitches to the other. However, for optimal fit patterns usually instruct some stitches to be cast on for the underarm, connecting the front and back stitches. But how to go about that, especially if the pattern does not mention a specific method to use?

In this tutorial, I’ll tell you all about both the backwards loop method and the knitted-on method. To show you how to go about it, I’m using my Cherry Puff sweater WIP as an example. It’s a design by Skeindeer Knits, you can find the pattern here (Ravelry link).

Materials used

Garment WIP: Cherry Puff work-in-progress, which I’m knitting in Lang Yarns Super Soxx 6 ply.

Other materials: I’m doing this project on a Zing circular knitting needle in size 3.5 mm (the green one pictured).

To start

Before we can start casting-on at the underarm, we first have to organize the stitches. I’ve knit to the shoulder stitches and have placed them on waste yarn. So, on the one needle we have the back stitches, and on the other the front stitches.

Using the backward loop cast-on

To work the backward cast-on, you just work the cast-on on the right-hand needle. A photo tutorial on that can be found here, the result can be seen below. On the following row, the newly cast-on stitches can be hard to knit into. Also, the loops of yarn may stretch out where they connect to the front or back stitches due to the loose character of this cast-on. A way to tighten this up, is to cast-on 2 extra stitches for each underarm section. On the following row or round, when you come to 1 stitch before the underarm stitches, work a decrease. Next, work to 1 stitch before the end of the underarm stitches and again work a decrease.

Result of casting on at the underarm, using the backward loop method

Using the knitted-on cast-on

The process to work the knitted-on cast-on is a bit more involved than the one for the backward loop cast-on. That said, the result is much neater, with still a bit of stretch in the resulting edge. A detailed photo tutorial on how to work this cast-on can be found here, below I’ll show you how to utilize it for casting on stitches mid-row.

On a side note: The cable cast-on is pretty similar in how it’s worked, but results in a sturdier edge. For that reason, I usually don’t use when casting on stitches for the underarm.

Turn the work
Usually the piece of knitting to which the yarn is connected, is on the right-hand needle. However, to be able to cast-on the new stitches with the knitted-on method, you need to turn the work. Position it in such a way that you’re looking at the wrong side of the fabric, and the needle with the piece of knitting to which the yarn is connected, is ready to be used as the left-hand needle.
Work the cast-on
The short version is that you insert the right-hand needle into the stitch nearest to the point of the left-hand needle, pull up a loop through that stitch, and place it on the same needle. This is repeated until you have the number of desired stitches.
Turn the work again to continue knitting over the next set of stitches
The result of casting on at the underarm, after working a couple of more rounds

Picking up the stitches

Of course, at a certain point, stitches have to be picked up from the cast-on to work the sleeves. The below picture shows where I did that in this particular project. That said, there are more loops to choose from when picking up stitches. The important thing is not to pick up just a single strand, because that will be very visible and a weaker join than when picking up two strands. In another tutorial, I’ll go into detail about how to deal with the gaps in the corners!

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tutorial – working the backward loop cast-on

The backward loop method of casting on stitches is also known as the thumb method of casting on, and as the “single cast-on”, “e-wrap cast-on”. It’s a stretchy cast-on that is quite easy to do. However, it tends to leave loops along the bottom edge, which can look rather loose. To counter that, it can be helpful to drop down a needle size for the cast-on, then going up again when continuing with the rest of your project. While the backward loop cast-on is pretty easy to work, I really don’t prefer it for most projects, because I find the stitches very hard to work into on the first row of knitting.

There is one place where this cast-on really shines, though: when stitches needed to be cast on in the middle of a row, like for the underarm of a sweater. Yes, those are still hard to knit into on the next row and may seem rather loose. However, the number of stitches is usually very small, making that less of an issue.

Let’s get started!

Working the backward loop cast-on step by step

Take your working yarn and loop it as shown in the picture below, with the yarn going to the project in front.
Next, insert the tip of the right needle from back to front through the loop.
Pull the yarn snugly around the needle.
Repeat steps 1-3 for as many stitches as needed.

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stitch pattern – bamboo stitch

A swatch of bamboo stitch in lilac yarn on a knitting needle.

The bamboo stitch is a wonderfully textured stitch. It looks very similar to bamboo shoots, with the horizontal lines dividing the sections. Hence, the name of this stitch pattern. Also, it’s much easier to work than it looks like. It can be used as all-over patterning in for example dish cloths or blankets. But it would also work very well as a strategically placed accent in a bigger project. It is a simple 2-row repeat, worked over a multiple of 2 stitches.

Let’s get started!