Stranded knitting, or Fair Isle knitting, is a fun way to get more color into your knitting projects. But I know it can be a little intimidating to figure out how to deal with the yarn.
Because you have to work with two different colors on each row or round, yarn management is different from when you only have one strand of yarn to deal with.
You might be tempted just to knit with the first color, drop it, pick up the next color yarn, work with it until you need to change colors, drop it, pick up the other yarn and so on.
But as long as it took me to describe that, it takes even longer to do.
There are other options:
- hold both yarns at the same time in your right hand
- hold both yarns at the same time in your left hand
- hold one yarn in your right hand and one in your left hand
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RV7ksRfUoek&w=600&h=480]
This video gives you a run down of all the options. I hope you’ll try them and figure out which one works best for you.
How do you hold the yarn when you do stranded knitting? I’d love to hear about it!
I am self taught, and I do it the clunky put-it-down-pick-it-up way. I will give the video a view and see if I can wrap my head around another way to manage the yarn. Perhaps I could get over my dread of multi color work that way!
Oh I hope you do try! It’s really awkward in the beginning but with a little practice you can probably find a method that works better for you.
I’m the same way as Amy, above — I was self-taught when it comes to Fair-Isle, and I still drop one yarn and pick up another. I’ve tried holding both yarns in my right hand, which doesn’t seem to stick. But I’m taking a look through the video right now, and maybe I’ll see something that does stick!
Thank you for posting this! It’s very timely for me, since I’m working on a huge colourwork project. 🙂
I hope it’s helpful!
It seems to be, actually. I’ve found that provided I’m paying attention, I can tension both yarns in my Right Hand, one around the index finger and one around the middle finger, and the video gives me a good idea of how to work with the yarns that way, which was my previous stumbling block.
The problem, is, then I start knitting with muscle memory, stop paying attention, and end up dropping the yarns again!
I’ve seen knitting thimbles to hold yarns for colourwork. I might give one of those a try. 🙂