Monday, November 26, 2007

Knitters, Help!

I really don't get picking up stitches. I can do it, but the whole process of figuring out how to pick them up evenly is incredibly frustrating and seems like I am making it MUCH harder than it has to be.

Furious Scribblings

This is a picture of my most recent attempt - I took a whole sheet of paper to calculate and recalculate what pattern of skipping and picking up stitches would yield the target. And in the end I winged (wung?) it.

Please share any wisdom you have about picking up stitches.

PS - These calculations were made during the Jim Trelease seminar, hence the note about HP (for you, Jody!)
Posted by Picasa

posted by Jen at 8:33 PM

7 Comments:

  • Picking up stitches is one of my bete noires (betes noire?) as well. If I'm picking up stitches on rows, I'll count the rows, divide by the number of stitches I'm supposed to pick up, and then pick up according to that number. Then I wing it. A lot.

    I just searched Knitty, though, because I'm having a gapping problem picking up stitches on Elba's socks, and I found these two articles:

    http://knitty.com/ISSUEwinter04/FEATwin04TT.html

    and

    http://www.knitty.com/issuespring05/FEATspr05TT.html

    By Blogger Jody, at 9:01 PM  

  • Argh! Yesterday I discovered the word "frog" (in the knitting sense) on someone else's blog. Today, after picking up the goddamn stitches, I employed the knitword frog, as I'd picked them all up on the wrong side. Grrrrr.

    By Blogger Jen, at 10:25 PM  

  • My method is inefficient but usually look good: I pick them all up. I knit into everything that could possibly be a stitch, and on the next row I decrease evenly (and/or wherever it won't show) as needed.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:50 AM  

  • Did you figure out what you wanted? Are you just trying to increase something or to pick up stitches for adding another piece on? I may be able to help if I can figure out what you are trying to do specifically!

    By Blogger Jennifer, at 2:14 AM  

  • Usually you end up picking up 2 stitches for every 3 stitches, but not always. Still, it's a good first-order approximation.

    My best advice, though, is to use a crochet hook to pick up stitches. It is sooooo much easier.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:08 PM  

  • That looks like a cross between Hebrew and sheet music. I'm totally useless.

    By Blogger hd, at 12:37 PM  

  • That last comment is from me. It's calling me by my real name again.

    -hd

    By Blogger hd, at 12:37 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home