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An Easy Way to Make Your Bind Off Neater

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How to make the end of your bind off neater.I’m sure you’ve noticed how the very last stitch of binding off can look a little messy. It’s usually bigger than the others and you can easily tell which end is the end of the bind off for that very reason.

Yarn Sub mentions the reason for this extra big loop is because there’s extra yarn in that stitch (and every stitch of a bind off, actually), and that to neaten it up you need to get rid of or cover up that extra yarn.

The way the post explains of capturing the extra yarn is to push the loop down, then pull on the yarn end until the elongated stitch straightens out.

There are lots of different methods for dealing with this problem. I often knit the last stitch together with the stitch before it instead of doing a traditional bind off on that stitch, which also helps. If you have a different method for dealing with an ugly end to your bind off (or if you’ve tried this one) I’d love to hear about it.

[Photo via Yarn Sub.]

Comments

  2. The method I use, and it never fails, is when I get to the last stitch I put my right-hand needle into the last stitch from the last row and then into the last bind off stitch, knit these two together and the pass the second last stitch over the last and then finish as above. I never get a dog ear.

Have you read?

Book Review: Circular Knitting for Beginners and Beyond

When I discovered Kate Atherley’s book Circular Knitting for Beginners and Beyond, I wasn’t sure there was enough to say about circular knitting to fill a book. It’s a pretty short book (144 pages) and includes 10 patterns to practice working in the round on small projects, and it provides a decent introduction to the various ways of working in the round. 

The book covers using double pointed knitting needles, flexible double points and circular knitting needles with cables. It talks about working using the full circumference of a circular needle and various ways to work smaller circumference projects, such as using DPNs, magic loop and knitting with two circular knitting needles. 

In addition there’s a discussion of preventing problems like twists and ladders, swatching in the round without actually swatching in the round, grafting, blocking and weaving in ends. 

More specialized techniques likes knitting from the center out, stranded colorwork, helical knitting and jogless stripes are also explored, as well as working pieces like socks or mitts two at a time. 

There’s also some information about seamless sweaters, including the different sweater designs that can be worked seamlessly (and why you might want seams in your sweaters) and how they are worked from the top down or the bottom up. 

There are 10 patterns in the book, including a basic stockinette stitch cowl and one with a deliberate twist, wrist warmers, mitts and a pair of colorwork mittens, a hat worked in a solid color or in helical stripes, toe up and top down socks and a beret. It would have been nice to have a basic sweater pattern, too, since the book does talk about working larger garments with circular needles, but it’s still a nice collection of basic patterns worked in the round. 

If you’re already comfortable working in the round in different ways, I’m not sure there’s much for you to learn in this book, but it is a good reference for people learning circular knitting or who maybe haven’t tried all the techniques yet or need skill building projects to try. 

About the book: 144 pages, paperback, 10 patterns. Published 2026 by David & Charles. Suggested retail price $24.99.