The Key to Understanding How Knitting Works

I love sharing educational information about knitting with you all. Sometimes I write it, and sometimes I find good posts from other people to share. This time it’s sharing a post that gets really deep into what is happening when you make a stitch and how yarn turns into knitting. This basic understanding of what a stitch is (that it’s just a piece of yarn, and how we manipulate it determines if it makes a knit or a purl) helps you understand that knit and purl are just the front and back of the same stitch.

You’ll want to read the whole post over at 10 Rows a Day, but I think it’s really important for new knitters (and others who might not have learned this when they were newer knitters) to understand what the stitches look like and how they’re made.

We call it “reading” your knitting, and it’s essential for noticing and knowing how to fix mistakes. It also helps you when your knitting pattern says something like “knit the knits and purl the purls as you see them.” If you don’t know what you’re looking for (or what you’re seeing) then you can’t follow this instruction.

Also once you intellectually understand that each stitch is a little piece of yarn, it feels a little less daunting to fixed a dropped stitch or another mistake in your knitting. And honestly, once you have the power and the confidence to fix mistakes — even if you have to rip out your work to do it — that’s when you start to gain the confidence to try new things, whether a new to you technique or a garment you’ve never knit before.

What helped you gain confidence or a deeper understanding of knitting when you were getting started? Have a tip you wish you knew when you were getting started? Let’s talk about it!

[Photo: 10 Rows a Day]

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There are so many things I love about the Stacking Stars pattern from Frankie Brown.

First, it looks like a kid’s toy, which it totally could be, though the intent is to stack the stars into a Christmas tree bit of decor.

I love the rainbow gradient, which makes it all the more cheerful, and serves as a reminder that, while you can plan out your colors beautifully, you can also use your stash for your own brilliant hodgepodge of a star tree.

It includes patterns for nine different sizes of stars, from 2 inch to 6 inch, which makes the perfect pile to look like a tree. What’s more, these stars are worked in garter stitch, so it’s a pretty easy pattern, even if you’re new to knitting. And the stars are solid, so not only can you use them to make your own amazing stack of a tree, you can make more to decorate packages, use as Christmas tree ornaments, make a darling garland, or all of the above.

The pattern calls for DK weight yarn but of course you could play with the yarn weight, too, to make stars that are even larger or smaller than the ones shown. And the bigger ones are made by just working more repeats, so you could continue to work as established to make larger ones to suit all your crafty purposes if you like.

Frankie’s patterns are free on Ravelry, but they ask that people who enjoy their patterns send a donation to the Children’s Liver Disease Foundation. Through the years they have raised more that £26,000 for the charity, which helps families of kids with liver disease. You can donate to Frankie’s fundraiser here. They have tons of great holiday projects and other designs you can check out on their designer page on Ravelry.

[Photo: Frankie Brown]

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