Fixing Mistakes in Colorwork

There are two ways to fix mistakes in colorwork other than frogging back until the mistake and starting to knit over again.

The first way is knit to the exact column where you see the error and purposely drop stitches until you get to the mistake. That's the easy part - the hard part is making sure you pick up THE RIGHT FLOAT as you are picking up the dropped yarns again. For instance if your mistake is 4 rows down and you're knitting with 2 colors per row there will be 8 strands of yarn and you'll only use 4 of them when picking up the stitches again. I'll get photos of this process soon - it really is a challenge to get it right.

I use basic duplicate stitch to fix colorwork mistakes that I notice long after the possibility of dropping stitches is over. That's what happened with the Christmas Bells mittens - I actually didn't even notice the mistakes until I looked at a photograph of the mittens.

So here I goofed and knit a "U" instead of an "O".

I never anchor the yarn by weaving in the ends before I start duplicate stitching - instead I wait until after I'm done to secure both ends. Usually to start I just thread the needle and insert it from the outside several inches from the spot I'm fixing. That way I can use both ends to adjust the tension after I'm done with the duplicate stitch so it looks its best.

The yarn starts from under the stitch to be fixed and goes around just like the original knit stitch. I always do duplicate stitch from right to left, from bottom to top. It looks much neater when you always do it in the same direction.

Fixed.

Recommended Wool Yarns for Stranded Color Knitting

Here is the yarn list for stranded color knitting I've been working on so far. I limited this to yarns fingering to worsted weight, non-superwash wool, plied and smooth textured, that come in a wide variety of colors. Each one is linked to the Ravelry yarn page and you can usually find vendors there. Because there was some confusion about which yarns are DK and which are sport weight I lumped them all together in the same category.It will probably be a month or so before I start on the list of all yarns good for colorwork that don't fit the original list. Thanks to everyone who helped me with the list!

FINGERING WEIGHT
Brown Sheep Nature Spun Fingering Weight
Rauma Finullgarn
Knitpicks’ Palette
Jamieson’s Shetland Spindrift
Jamieson & Smith 2-ply Jumper Weight Wool
Vuorelma Satakieli
Jaggerspun Digit Yarn
Koigu Premium Merino Yarn
Harrisville New England Shetland
Bella Vita Farm’s Naturally Dyed Fingering Weight
Sunday Knits Eden
Kauni Evilla Solids
Rauma Lamullgarn
Blackberry Ridge 100% Wool Fingering Weight
Elemental Affects Natural Shetland Fingering
JaggerSpun Maine Line 2/8
Klippan Tuna
Wensleydale Longwool 4 Ply
Black Water Abbey 2 Ply Fingering
Taiga Yarns L’Attitude
Taiga Yarns Nostalgia

SPORT AND DK WEIGHT
Brown Sheep Nature Spun Sport Weight
Elann’s Peruvian Highland Sport
Knitpicks Telemark Yarn
Reynolds Whiskey
Dale of Norway Heilo
Knitpicks Merino Style
Jamieson’s Shetland DK
SandnesGarn Peer Gynt
Rauma Strikkegarn
Jo Sharp Classic DK Wool
Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sport
Quebecoise
SandnesGarn Tove
Virtual Yarns 2-Ply
Virtual Yarns Scottish Fleet
Hifa 2 Ullgarn
Rauma Istra
Ashford Tekapo
Classic Elite Classic One Fifty
Reynolds Soft Sea Wool
Blackberry Ridge 100% Wool Sport Weight
Wensleydale Longwool DK

WORSTED WEIGHT
Cascade 220
Brown Sheep Nature Spun Worsted Weight
Elann’s Peruvian Highland Wool
Knitpicks’ Wool of the Andes
Jamieson’s Shetland Heathered Aran (formerly Soft Shetland)
Ram Wools Selkirk
Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted
Ella Rae Classic Worsted
Paton’s Classic Wool
Briggs & Little Heritage 2 Ply
Reynolds Candide
Universal Deluxe Worsted Solid
Plymouth Galway Worsted
Harrisville New England Highland
Classic Elite Renaissance
Shepherd Yarn’s Shepherd Classic
Rauma Vamsegarn
Lion Brand Wool Solids
Virtual Yarns 3-Ply
Hifa 3 Ullgarn
Briggs & Little Regal
Frog Tree Merino Melange Worsted
Reynolds Soft Sea Worsted
Cottage Craft 2 Ply Wool
Blackberry Ridge 100% Wool Medium Weight
Elemental Affects Natural Shetland Worsted
Philosopher’s Wool 2-Ply
Wensleydale Longwool Aran

I really love this picture of Jack. I have to hold him when we go outside because otherwise he's off chasing lizards. He once saw one in a tree which was probably the most exciting thing that has happened in his whole life.

Knitting Three Colors Per Row

In a perfect world all stranded color knitting patterns would specify just two colors per row. However, there are times you'll see three or even four colors per row (Dale of Norway, I'm looking at you!) in a color pattern chart. So how do you hold all those yarns?

First of all, you don't even have to knit three or four colors per row. Instead you can just knit with two colors and later go back and duplicate stitch the third color. Or you can just knit with two colors, slipping all the stitches that are to be knit with the third color. Then you go back and knit the exact same row again, slipping the stitches you just knit and knitting the third and fourth color stitches you slipped previously.

Still, if you want to knit 3 colors per row there are many, many ways to do this. All are a variety of the methods I've shown last week. You can put all three yarns in your left hand, 3 yarns in your right hand, or 2 yarns in one hand and 1 yarn in the other hand. In knitting with 3 colors a row you don't even have to worry about finding a method that doesn't tangle because they all do as far as I can tell. I generally stop a few times per row to detangle the yarns when knitting 3 color rows.



Here's how I hold the yarns for a 3 color row. The background color is again in my right hand and the other two colors are both stranded over my left index finger.

I knit the yarn in my right hand English/American style and grab the specific yarn I need from my left hand finger and knit continental. This method is slow-going though.

I plan to try the method shown above the next time I have a three color row. I'll put all three colors in my strickfingerhut/knitting thimble and simply use the right hand needle to grab the color I need. I haven't experimented with this method much but I do think it will reduce tangling and the tangles that do occur will be easier to deal with.

Using a Norwegian Knitting Thimble/Strickfingerhut

First of all, there are several kinds of strickfingerhuts and the kind shown here is NOT the preferred kind to buy. Instead go for a metal one that looks like THIS as it fits your finger better, won't break, and holds the two yarns farther apart which is the whole purpose of this handy gadget. If you google "knitting thimble" you'll find a wide variety - there is even a type that fits over your fingertip like a sewing thimble.

The biggest advantage of using the plastic type shown here is that it can hold three or four yarns. In fact it may even be the best method of knitting 3 colors per row without excessive yarn twisting. Anyway, they're all around $3 so get a few and play with them.

Strickfingerhuts are mainly used by Continental knitters although I occasionally hear of a right-hand knitter who has figured out a way to use one. It normally goes on the left index finger and I like placing it as far down toward my middle knuckle as possible. That way I don't have to lift my index finger so high while knitting.



To use the plastic type, you open it up and insert the strands of yarn and close it up again. With the plastic type I put the two yarns as far away from each other as possible.



To knit the lower yarn you simply go over or under it and grab it and pull it through the knit stitch on the needle.



To knit the higher yarn try doing it similarly to yesterday's post on two colors in the left hand - grab the higher yarn by going over it and pulling through. You can use the rest of your fingers to hold/tension the yarns however you like. Many Continental knitters say that this handy gadget has greatly increased their 2-color knitting speed.

Tomorrow I'll talk about two-handed two-color knitting and this weekend I'll discuss some methods of knitting 3 color rows.

Here are my latest Roy G Biv socks knit in worsted weight yarn from the stash. I wish I'd been able to find a brighter yellow in the stash.

Knitting with Two Colors in Your Left Hand

HOLDING TWO COLORS WITH YOUR LEFT HAND

Continental knitters shouldn't be afraid to try to knit with two colors in one hand because it is done very similarly to how they knit with one color.

With this method you tension both yarns over the left hand index finger. Here's how I do it.



By stranding the yarns as shown (one going over and one going under the middle finger) I can try to avoid the two yarns ending up too close to each other on my index finger. (A strickfingerhut can also help keep the yarns separate but I'll talk about using one tomorrow.)



The yarn lowest on the finger is knit normally - by taking the right hand needle, putting it through the stitch on the left hand needle knitwise, then going over or under the lowest yarn with the right hand needle and pulling it through the stitch. I don't think it matters much whether you go over or under the yarn to grab it. Here I am going under the green yarn.



To knit the color held higher on the finger, nearer the fingertip, you take the right hand needle, put it through the stitch on the left hand knitwise, reach beyond the black yarn and grab the green yarn and pull it through the needle. I've tried grabbing this second yarn by either going under or over the yarn and I've found that using the needle to grab the color by going OVER the yarn is faster for me.



Here the black yarn is pulled through and I'm back to where I started.
As I said, the biggest difficulty I have using this method is how to keep the two yarns separate enough on my index finger so I can easily choose one color to knit. I do notice I lift my left index finger often to help tension the two yarns. Or I can use a strickfingerhut/knitting thimble. More on that tomorrow.

Knitting with Two Colors in Your Right Hand

I'm not sure I can top the heart-stopping, earth-shattering excitement of Thumb Week last year on this blog but this week I'm going to show different ways of holding the yarns for stranded color knitting.

Before I start I want to say again that ANY way you hold the yarns is a good method if you aren't twisting the two yarns. Some new color knitters use the pick up and drop method which involves knitting and holding only one color at a time and letting the other color hang. Unfortunately the pick up and drop method is really really slow so do try out one of these methods this week to see if it will click with you.

I think the shape of knitter's hands really dictates which method will feel the best. I'm going to show four different methods this week - five if I can find my strickfingerhut - but there are even more methods than that.

TWO COLORS IN YOUR RIGHT HAND

I've read that most knitters in the U.S. knit using the English/American/throwing method. When I first began knitting with two colors, I used this method of holding both colors in my right hand.



Here's how you start. One color over the index finger in the right hand and one color over the middle finger.



To knit with the red yarn, simply flick your index finger UP and grab the yarn and wrap around the right hand needle.




To knit with the black yarn make sure your index finger returns to being between the red yarn above and the black yarn below as is shown in the first photo here. Then move your index finger DOWN and UNDER the black yarn.



Pull the black yarn around the right hand needle. It is hard to see in this photo but the red yarn is ABOVE the black yarn.



Voila! You've now knit with both the red and the black yarns. Your right index finger does the bulk of the work. Return to the position shown in the first photo after each color change.

With this particular method the black yarn is held ABOVE the red yarn on the back of the work. This means that the red yarn will be dominant; i.e., the red stitches will be a bit larger and more noticeable in your design. Generally I use the dominant color for the design or foreground color and the other color for the background.

Dealing with Floats

I've answered so many questions regarding weaving floats lately that I thought I'd do a blog post on the subject. Floats are the unused strand of yarn on the back of your work when you knit with two colors. Keeping the tension of your floats even is important for good tension. If you're knitting a design in black and white and you knit 5 straight stitches in black, then you will have a resulting float 5 stitches long of white yarn on the back of your work. If you have good color knitting tension the floats on the back of your work will be uniform and will easily show the reverse of the design you're knitting.



In traditional Fair Isle knitting, there are no floats longer than 5 stitches but in other forms of stranded color knitting there can be some really long floats. Really long floats (longer than an inch) can cause your fingers or toes to be caught when you put on the item and they can mess with your knitting tension. They are especially problematic in a project for a young child. If a charted colorwork design includes many incredibly long floats (longer than 15 stitches) it may be better worked as intarsia than stranded color knitting.

One solution for long floats is to weave the floats or catch them as you're knitting. To do this you secure the unused yarn with the yarn you're knitting while you are knitting . Your two yarns shouldn't tangle if you're weaving your floats correctly.

HERE is a link showing how this is done if you're a two-handed knitter. There are two separate methods for weaving floats depending on which yarn you are weaving. Weaving floats can also adversely affect your knitting tension so make sure you do it loosely. The photo below shows how you lift the dark color yarn to weave it while you continue knitting with the light color yarn.



Knitpicks has a helpful PDF HERE that has a page devoted to explaining how to weave floats - they call it wrapping the yarn while you knit.

The Philosopher's Wool method of color knitting involves weaving floats frequently, perhaps every 3rd or 4th stitch. If you look at their video HERE , you'll see what they call stitches 3 and 4 are actually the two methods of weaving the floats in two-handed color knitting. You can get a completely different type of fabric with frequent float weaving - more like a woven fabric and it is a great method for knitting socks that are bulletproof. Weaving floats more frequently is also a great idea for colorwork glove fingers.

One problem with weaving floats is that the unused color can sometimes show through on the front of the work. Do NOT weave a float in the exact same vertical row as you did the previous row (this will definitely make the unused color show through the front) and consider not weaving your floats if you're using high contrast yarns (such as black and white).

Another solution for really long floats is to not weave them but instead go back and LOOSELY tack them down after you're done knitting. If this is done too tightly, it will compromise the elasticity of the knitting. HERE is a previous blog post on how I tacked down some extra long floats on one project. If you decide not to weave a long float, make sure you spread out the stitches a bit on the right needle before you knit with the second color to ensure the float tension won't be too tight.

Personally I rarely weave floats. I'm generally happy with my color knitting tension and I rarely knit for toddlers (who'd find long floats more problematic). Plus weaving floats slows me down too much.

Stranded and Fair Isle Knits

Update: I finally got around to putting links to my free patterns and knitting info posts on the blog. They're located at the bottom of the sidebar on the right.



I hope everyone joins the Stranded Colorwork Knitalong - their purpose is to encourage more knitters to try this wonderful type of knitting. If you think you might want to try your hand at stranded color knitting, check it out.

It was a process for me to become enamored with knitting with more than one color. It definitely did not happen instantly. The very first stranded color knitting project I did was the Holiday Socks from Homespun Handknit. They were too large and I gave them away.

The very first time I knit colorwork with two hands was for these socks from the Stahl Socka Book Number Nine (now out of print). I forced myself to do the entire project using both hands and by the time I finished the socks I felt pretty comfortable with two-handed color knitting. I still wasn't sure about dealing with all those ends though.



I think I became hopelessly in love with stranded color knitting when I started doing Norwegian projects. I have long suspected I was a Norwegian in a former life. Here is a Dale of Norway moose sweater I made from Nature Spun sport weight. The pattern is out of print I believe but I call it the Bullwinkle sweater. DH's nickname is Moose so I just had to make it for him.



Although I don't do it often and some of the designs don't really appeal to me, deep down I think that Fair Isle knitting is the pinnacle of all stranded color knitting. I believe it is certainly the hardest to design from a color standpoint. Here is a Fair Isle tam I designed and knit in a sea theme in about 12 colors of Shetland yarn. I used the Alice Starmore article on how to design your own tam in the Threads Knitting Around the World book.