let me explaiKnit

Tickle your ribs

I've seen a lot of questions lately on a couple of topics. The first is ribbing -- a lot of people are noticing that the stitches in the last knit column of each knit rib are loose, and wondering if there's anything they can do about that. The second is also loose stitches, but in cabling, and this time it's the first purl that seems to be the culprit.

As you might have guessed from the fact that I'm addressing these together, the problems are related. In fact, they're the same problem, really -- cables are, effectively, fancy ribbing, and the same factors that make them "fancy" also make this issue manifest just a bit differently than it does in straight ribbing. We'll look at the issue in ribbing first, and then talk a little bit about why it shows up in a different way in cables.

It turns out that the problem and the solution are both somewhat related to the asymmetrical YO issue. Theoretically, if you were to take away the row of stitches below, the current row of stitches on your needle would just be a spiral of yarn around the needle, in the direction that's counterclockwise if you're looking at the tip of the needle, regardless of whether those stitches were worked as knits or as purls. That's theory, however, and practice is often just a tad different. In practice, it matters where the yarn starts out. In practice, as you form a purl stitch that follows a knit stitch, your yarn has to come from behind the fabric, all the way under the right needle, and around it a full time until it's in front of the right needle again; this ends up being a longer path than the yarn takes when forming a purl stitch that follows another purl, since there the yarn starts from the front side of the fabric. A purl stitch that follows a knit stitch uses more yarn, just as a YO between a knit and a purl does.

So why is it the last knit column that ends up appearing loose instead of the first purl column, since that's where the actual extra yarn is coming in? I'll confess I'm not 100% sure; however, I do have a theory (you knew I would, right?). In June Hemmons Hiatt's The Principles of Knitting, she states that when you're working decreases, the stitch that's to the right will end up slightly bigger than the one that's to the left -- this is why it's so hard to get your left-slanting decreases to match the right-slanting k2tog, even when you're working them in a way that structurally should be a mirror. The reason for this phenomenon, as I understand it, is the interplay between stitches as you work. As you move stitches onto the right needle, there's tension between the needles on the stitch you've just worked, which is just below the right needle; normally, you don't see the results of this, because every stitch gets an equal tug in its turn, but when you do a decrease, you're moving two stitches at a time, and the one further to the right is insulated from this tightening process, so it ends up looking looser. I think something similar goes on with ribbing; there's extra yarn in the space between the knit and the purl, so the knit stitch doesn't get tightened down as it normally would. There's not a lot of extra yarn, true, but it's not a big tug, so I think it's enough to offset it.

So why are cables sometimes somewhat different? Again, I'm not completely sure; however, it's worth noting that often, what people take to be the purl stitch is actually the bar between the knit and the following purl, and that's where the looseness is usually occurring for those who have this issue. My operating theory on this one is that the cabling process produces a counteracting stress on the stitches, pulling on them from the right side instead of the left, and that this tends to draw out the bar between the knit and the purl stitch, emphasizing any looseness that might be there. This theory finds support in the fact that for many people the looseness is more noticeable with more frequently crossed cables -- it will be more apparent in a 4-stitch cable crossed every 4 rows than in the same cable crossed every 8, for instance, because the more frequent crossing puts more tension on the knit stitches to act as a group. It probably also makes some difference that the final knit column is not, by the nature of cabling, always the same column, which tends to mask looseness there since it's not always affecting the same group of stitches.

Now that we've looked at the causes, what are the solutions? There are a couple of fairly simple ones, and probably there are others out there that would also be workable.

One solution is to simply tug the extra yarn back out of the space between the knit and the purl: after you've formed the first purl, give a tug on the working yarn until you feel a slight release as the excess yarn between the two stitches slides through. With a bit of practice, this will become a very natural motion, almost an unconscious habit; the reason for doing it after completing the purl stitch is that that stitch will then hold the yarn in place, whereas if you just try to yank the yarn tight when forming the purl stitch, it will usually slip back.

The other simple solution is not to let the extra yarn get in there in the first place; form your first purl by wrapping the yarn clockwise, as is done with combined knitting. With this method, the yarn goes over the needle from back to front, making less than a full circuit, rather than going more than a full circuit. It can actually result in the purl column ending up tight instead of the knit column ending up loose, but tightness in ribbing is less noticeable than looseness, and more attractive even if it's noticed.

It helps, also, to work your ribbing tightly. Many patterns recommend dropping a needle size or two; experiment with dropping even more than that, and see what you think of the results. When the stitches are tight for the yarn being used, the effects of the interplay are lessened, and often this results in an improvement. Obviously there is a limit to the degree to which you can do this, but it's a fruitful area for experimentation.

For ribbing that you've already worked, don't worry too much about the looseness; over time, with washing and wearing, the stitches will become more equalized. You can hurry this process somewhat with some aggressive blocking -- tugging the ribbing vertically will encourage the excess yarn to redistribute.

Darn! A hole! (and other sockly issues)

Once a sock knitter has completed that first sock and realized that in fact they're not only not scary, but actually pretty fun, the biggest fear becomes, "What if I get a hole in them?"  Therefore, let's talk about hole prevention and repair, and we'll cover a little general sock maintenance while we're at it.

First, there are things you can do in the knitting process that will make your socks less prone to holes.  A sock knit at a tighter gauge wears better than a looser one, so knitting at a minimum of 8 stitches per inch is a great idea, and knitting at 10 st/in is even better. It's also possible to add reinforcing thread/yarn in the knitting process, particularly at the heels and toes which tend to be high-wear spots.  There are specialty sock reinforcement yarns sold for this purpose, and a few brands of sock yarn come with a matching spool tucked right into the ball.  Many people also like Woolly Nylon, which is a thread sold for use in sergers (a specialized type of sewing machine); this yarn is 100% nylon, with a fair amount of stretch to it that allows it to move well with the sock yarn, and a soft texture, which means it tends to feel fine on the feet, and it comes in a large number of colors so a good choice should be easy to find.  With either sock reinforcement yarn or Woolly Nylon, the reinforcement can be knit right along with the sock yarn, usually without a change in gauge.  It's also possible to just double-strand the yarn you're already using for the heels and toes, but you may need to go down a few needle sizes to maintain your gauge.  You can also use a reinforcing stitch pattern, like the heel stitch or eye-of-partridge stitch that are common choices for a heel flap; unlike reinforcing yarn, it is easy to use these in an area aside from the toes and heels, such as the ball of the foot, which is a high-wear area for some people.  Finally, be sure you knit your socks long enough; a too-short sock will wear through in the toe more quickly than one which fits properly.

There are some preventative steps that can be taken after the sock is finished, also.  If you didn't knit in reinforcing yarn, but you've changed your mind, it can be duplicate-stitched in, or woven in on the inside with a sharp tapestry needle.  To weave it in, turn the sock inside out.  Stitch in a grid pattern, catching the purl bumps on the back of each knitted stitch, and going back and forth across the area to be reinforced and then up and down as well.  Areas such as the ball of the foot, which are tough to knit with a carry-along yarn in the round, are readily amenable to this sort of reinforcement.  Duplicate-stitch reinforcement with the sock yarn is particularly good for areas where the foot could use a little extra padding, too.

A little maintenance will help you catch holes before they're a big problem.  When you launder your socks, inspect them, looking for thin or frayed spots.  If you find such a spot, go ahead and duplicate stitch over the area now, while you've still got the original yarn to guide your stitches; this is much easier than darning an actual hole.  And for goodness' sake, if you find yourself doing this on the same spot on more than one pair of socks, go ahead and put some reinforcement in that spot on the rest of your socks too, because it's obviously a wear spot for you.

If a hole actually breaks through before you catch it, then you're going to need to darn the area.  Darning is the process of creating some new fabric to cover the hole, and I'm going to tell you about three ways to do it: traditional darning, which is a species of weaving; duplicate stitch darning; and splicing in a new patch of knitting.

To do traditional darning, you'll need a sharp needle, some sewing thread in a matching or coordinating color, a tapestry needle, and something to create the darned patch, which can be more of your sock yarn or any similarly sized yarn, or substitutes such as embroidery floss if you no longer have any of the sock yarn.  You may also want a darning egg, or a plastic ball or plastic Easter egg to substitute for one; you use this by putting it inside the sock, so it gives you a firm surface to work against, which is helpful for getting a darn that's not puckered.  You'll start by putting in a reinforcing framework with the sewing thread.  Go far enough into the fabric of the sock that you're not working in any damaged stitches, and using very small backstitches, sew a rectangle of thread around the hole with the sewing thread.  You want these stitches to split the yarn of the existing stitches, so they're well-anchored; these will be the anchor of your patch.  Now, switch to your darning yarn and your tapestry needle.  Starting at one lower corner of the box of anchoring threads you just made, go under the reinforcing thread, draw a long thread across the box so that it's snug but doesn't pucker the box, and go under the reinforcing thread on the other side, and then come back to the first side, under the reinforcing thread, etc. Create a web of parallel threads, going back and forth from one side of the box to the other, and finish in one of the upper corners.  Now, you're going to weave through this structure you just created.  Starting at the upper corner, go under the reinforcing thread, and then go over the first strand, under the second, over the third, etc., until you reach the bottom of the box, and go under the reinforcing thread.  Work back to the top, going over strands you went under before, and vice versa.  Continue doing that until you have a solid woven mat of threads covering the hole, each anchored to the reinforcing threads, and then weave in your ends.

A traditional darn leaves a very strong patch, but you can definitely see it; it looks like weaving, not knitting.  A duplicate-stitch darn, on the other hand, looks just like the surrounding knit stitches.  If you catch the hole before the stitches actually break, it's simple enough to trace the existing stitches, however thin, but if they've already broken (unless it's maybe just a couple of stitches), you'll need to create a framework for the stitches that bridge the gap.  You'll need the same supplies as for the traditional darning, above.  Someone else has already made a great tutorial for this type of darning, so I'll just share that with you and go on.

The other great way to patch a hole so it looks just like the surrounding knitting is to knit in a patch; I'd probably use duplicate stitch for a little hole, and this method for a large one.  To do this method, you'll need some of the yarn the socks were knit with (or a substitute in the same gauge), needles of the size it was knit with, your tapestry needle, and a pair of sharp scissors.  Use the scissors to trim the hole to a rectangular shape, so that you have a column of completely undamaged stitches on either side, and a row of completely undamaged stitches above and below.  You should have free stitches above and below the hole, in numbers equal to the number of columns of stitches involved in the hole; put those on two separate DPNs.  Using the bottom stitches and the repair yarn, knit back and forth across those stitches until the patch is one row shorter than the hole.  Thread your yarn onto the tapestry needle, and use kitchener stitch grafting to graft the patch to the sock stitches above.  Then, use the tapestry needle to duplicate stitch over the outside column of the patch and the first undamaged columns of the sock, for every row, on both sides of the patch; using a sharp tapestry needle, and splitting the plies of the sock stitches, will help make sure the patch is thoroughly integrated into the sock.  Weave in your ends, and you're done.

And finally, while we're talking about taking care of your socks, let's talk about washing them.  If you do your laundry on cold, most superwash socks can just go right in the laundry; I wash and dry all of my superwash pairs this way.  Non-superwash socks, however, should be handwashed and laid out to dry, and to tell the truth, many superwash socks will last longer and look better with this treatment as well.  For handwashing socks, if you have other handwash items that you're doing fairly regularly, throwing the socks in with these is relatively little trouble, but what if you don't?  Then, I recommend the Yarn Harlot sockwashing method -- it's fun!

What Stephanie does is to wear the socks into the bath (she takes baths -- the shower will work too).  Lather them up while you're in there, rinse them out when you're done, and lay them out to dry.  It's quick, it can easily be done at the next bathing opportunity after you wear the socks so you'll constantly have clean socks and not have to wait for laundry day, and your washing liquids are already conveniently located -- one of the best washes for wool socks is shampoo!  Regular adult shampoo is as great for wool as it is for hair, and usually has the slight acidity that wool really likes; baby shampoo is less great, since its pH is designed to be gentle to eyes rather than to hair, but it'll do in a pinch.  And cotton socks will do fine with bar soap, which is alkaline; if you've got a blend, though, go for the shampoo instead.  What a nifty method! Stephanie is a genius.

Sweater Surgery

So, you've been knitting your fingers off on a lovely sweater, and the top is great, but despite your best attempts at self-deception, you're finally forced to face it: it's just too long.  Hits at a horrible spot, bags around your hips, completely not working.  It would be perfect if you could just take a couple of inches off; unfortunately, you knitted it from the bottom up with a ribbed waistband, and ripping out ribbing from the cast-on row is a real bear.  Or maybe you just hate the bottom ribbing, and wish you'd done a straight or rolled hem.  Or maybe it's even too short, and you'd like to have an extra couple of inches above where the ribbing is.

The answer is sweater surgery.  In most cases, it's possible to cut off the offending bottom, and reknit the bottom of the sweater in a manner more to your liking.

You're going to need a thin circular, preferably several sizes smaller than the size you knitted the sweater with; the length isn't terribly important as long as it's enough to go comfortably around the sweater (or across the front or back half, if it was knitted flat).  If you don't have a suitable needle, you can use a tapestry needle threaded with a smooth yarn or a piece of thin ribbon, but you'll need to transfer the stitches back to a needle before you can knit them, whereas with a thin circular you can knit from it directly.  You'll also need some good sharp scissors.

Turn the sweater upside down, so the area to be removed is at the top; if it was knit flat and has already been seamed, you'll want to undo the seams in the part to be removed so you can work with the edge stitches.  Select a row to become your live stitches, from which you will knit your new sweater bottom. Using the thin circ, pick up the right leg of each of these stitches.  Just to be extremely clear here: sometimes when people say to "pick up" stitches, they mean to pull a loop of the working yarn through each stitch, forming a new stitch on the needle -- that is not what I mean.  You want to actually capture the right leg of the existing stitches on the needle; no working yarn is involved at all. If you get the left leg instead, it isn't a big deal, but you'll need to knit the stitches through the back when you start knitting down, so they're not twisted. Just check them as you work that first row, and be sure you're knitting through the right leg of every stitch, whether it's in front or in back.

Once you've captured all the stitches for your new working row, it's time to cut the excess part of the knitting free.  You want to leave the first several stitches on the row above the captured row intact; these will provide the tail for you to weave in, where you join your working yarn to knit downward.  Leave about two horizontal inches worth of stitches for a 6" tail, a few more if you prefer a longer tail to work with.

Now, there are a couple of ways to do the cutting, depending on how bold you are.  You can snip a single stitch, choosing the stitch right after the tail stitches you're leaving intact, and then unravel one row stitch by stitch.  You can cut straight across the knitting a couple of rows above the needle you placed, and then unravel back down to the needle, which may require picking out some stitches one by one, depending on the type of stitch.  Or, you can cut each of the stitches on the row right above the needle, in which case it's important to remember that for that first couple of inches, you want to cut two rows above, so the tail stitches stay intact; this last option leaves you the least amount of subsequent work to do, but it takes a little more nerve.  Whichever option you choose, once you've separated the stitches on one row, the former sweater bottom will come off in a piece, and can then be easily unraveled top-down to reclaim that yarn, if you wish.

You're now ready to join yarn and knit the new bottom of your sweater, but there are a few things to note before you begin.  First, because you're now working with what were formerly the bottoms of your stitches, you're offset by half a stitch.  This isn't a problem if you're working in stockinette; because you're also going in the other direction, the new stitches will nest nicely into the old ones, and the point where you changed direction will be no more noticeable than a well-done grafting job, which is to say generally completely invisible.  However, you'll also have one stitch fewer, which means you may need to increase by one, or decrease by one fewer if you previously increased after the ribbing, in order to make your ribs come out evenly.

If you're working in something other than stockinette and you're not going straight into a new bottom ribbing, the half-stitch offset becomes an issue, because the jog will show.  The solution is to change your stitch pattern -- do a band of something else for half an inch or an inch, and then switch back to your pattern stitch, and that will fool the eye sufficiently.  If your design won't work with something like that, then you probably don't want to try this technique.

Are there other situations where this technique shouldn't be used?  Yes, of course; nothing's universal.  In particular, you'll notice that in the opening paragraph, every situation I mentioned involved a ribbed bottom.  There's a reason for that.  Ribbing is a major hassle to rip from the cast-on edge; the way you move the yarn back and forth results in the yarn being woven through the stitches as they appear from the bottom up, so you have to unpick every individual stitch, and that makes cutting the ribbing off in a piece really appealing.  Stockinette, on the other hand, rips as easily from the bottom as from the top, so for a rolled-hem sweater, it's better to unpick the cast-on row and rip upward than it is to cut.

This technique can, of course, be used on sleeves and other situations, not just sweater bottoms.  While it won't rescue every knitting misstep, it can be a real lifesaver in the situations it's suited to.

ETA: I've just recently become aware of this nice little tutorial which shows this method with pictures.  Enjoy!