Knitting

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How to Hold Yarn When Stranded Knitting

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how to hold yarn for stranded knittingStranded 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!

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Comments

  1. 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!

  2. 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.

  3. 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. 🙂

  5. 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. 🙂

Have you read?

Knit a Sweet Hood Covered with Flowers

I happen to live in the Northern Hemisphere, but I know we have a lot of Southern Hemisphere friends, too, who are heading into the cooler months as we are warming up. Whichever one of the seasons you’re in, you might want to  stitch up this sweet little hood.

This pattern by saskie&co is called snug hood and it uses two colors of yarn to make a close-fitting pixie style hood (almost a balaclava but it doesn’t cover your face, though there is a neck covering portion to keep you a little warmer). You can use the fingering weight wool and mohair held together that are called for in the pattern, or use a single strand of DK weight yarn.

The neck portion and the edging around the face are worked in ribbing in a single color, while the body of the hat includes an allover colorwork flower pattern. The project is worked both flat and in the round and there is colorwork that is knit flat, which means you’ll have to purl in colorwork (which some people don’t like; also, you can’t see what you’re doing as well on the back of the work).

The pattern comes in one size and the colorwork is charted. Testers noted this is a quick and easy project and a great way to learn some new skills (chart reading, working stranded colorwork flat) if you’ve never tried those things before. They noted the hood is cute, comfortable and warm, and a few said it didn’t take as much yarn as the pattern suggests, so bear that in mind if you’re trying to use stash.

Speaking of the pattern notes, check out all the cute color variations in the projects on Ravelry. From pink and red to blue and white to gray and cream, there are lots of great options to think about.

You can buy this pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: saskie&co]