Join a New Ball of Yarn

If the Spit Splice or Russian Join aren't your deal, try just picking up your new yarn and knitting it in.

I like to do this if at all possible at the beginning of a new row, because it seems a bit neater for me, and is easier for me to weave in the ends of the old/new yarn.  Sometimes, however, it may be necessary to join somewhere else along your row.  This is fine.

This is how I do it:  Wrap the tail of the new ball around my finger to keep it out of the way, then, holding the tail from the old ball and the working yarn together, knit 3-4 stitches.  Drop the tail and continue knitting.

Remember on the return row you will have what looks like two stitches where you knit with both the old tail and new working yarn.  Be sure you knit these together as one stitch, otherwise you will be increasing your stitch count.  Weave in loose ends, and you are good to go.

Here is a video.  Happy Knitting!

Mattress Stitch

This was requested by a YouTube friend.  I personally avoid seams whenever possible.  I just don't like to seam.  When I bind off, I want to be done!  But I do love how this makes an invisible join that you really can't see at all.  Below are still photos, as well as a video of some small stockinette pieces being joined with Mattress Stitch.

My sample was done on stockinette fabric, however this could really be used with any stitch or fabric.  Do keep in mind that you should add a couple of extra stitches to the sides of your fabric so that you can seam easily, and you won't lose any width.  Seaming takes away from the width of your fabric - patterns that require seaming should have that fact accounted for, so no need to worry about adding extra stitches if you are following a pattern.  But if you are designing your own pattern, just keep in mind when calculating the size.  

OK, so here we go.

1. Your fabric should be placed with right sides facing.  You will be working in a side to side fashion. 
2. Use the same yarn that you knit your garment with.  To make things easy, you can either reserve a length of tail from your cast on, or bind off, for this purpose.  Or you can simply cut a length of yarn to use instead.
3. Don't seam along the immediate edge of your fabric; instead, move over to the first line of stitches.  You could always move over two lines of stitches, but that will make the back side a bit bulkier. 
4. Be sure that you stay straight as you seam up the fabric.
5. For the sake of clarity, we will say we are starting with the left piece of fabric here, but you may start with whichever piece of fabric you like.  
6. Beginning at the cast on edge of the left piece of fabric, insert your yarn or tapestry needle into the cast-on edge stitch, then do the same on the right piece of fabric.
7. On the left piece of fabric, insert your needle under the first strand of yarn between the edge stitches and the first line of stitches.
8. Repeat on the right piece of fabric.
9. Continue moving left, right, left, right and so on, until you reach the top of your fabric.  Then, insert the needle into the stitch along the bind off edge on both the left and right piece of fabric.
10. Now, gently pull on the tail of your yarn to tighten things up.  Pulling from both ends is easiest for me.  You will see that the yarn you used to sew up disappears like magic.  Don't pull too tightly or your fabric will become misshapen.  Just pull gently until the seam is neat and even.  Weave in the loose ends.

Now, if you are like me, you may be scratching your head and saying "Huh?!" after reading that.  I find visual aids much more easy to understand than the written word.  So, here are some pictures, and the video.

These are the strands that you will be picking up and running your needle and yarn under

Yarn has been inserted into the cast on edge stitches of each piece of fabric

Needle going under the first strand

I have started weaving from left to right, left to right

I have now finished weaving all the way to the top of my fabric, and the yarn has been placed into each stitch along the bind off edge as well

The yarn used to seam has been pulled tight, and I now have an invisible join!  

You can see how beautifully these pieces of stockinette fabric have been joined.  Here is a sample of seed stitch fabric I joined, which is just as nice.

Join a New Ball of Yarn

Yarn is Cascade 220

 How great is this join?!  Simple and easy to do - you can use any yarn, too.  Other than the Spit Splice, or Felted Join, this has to be my favorite method of joining a new ball of yarn.  Rather than still photos, I am just doing the video on this one.  If you haven't tried this yet, you must. You will need a yarn or tapestry needle to do this, and about 30-60 seconds.  That's it.

In the picture above, I used two different colors just for ease of demonstration, but most likely you will be using the same color of yarn.  Even if you are using two different colors, once you've knit the join area, it really blends in well with the fabric and you will be hard pressed to tell where the join is once it is done.

Hope you like it.  Happy Knitting and Enjoy!

Halloween Knitting Patterns and Stuff

It is that time of year again... my favorite time.  October, autumn... and Halloween!  Here are a few knitting patterns for your perusal.

Halloween Cat Dishcloth - from One Crafty Mama

Halloween Witch Doll - from Purl Soho

Happy Halloween Mitts - from Home Makers Insanity

Hallowig - from Knitty

Lacy Jack-O-Lantern Dishcloth - from Coats and Clark

There are oodles of other patterns out there, just Google or Bing away and you will find them.

Also, I will once again be watching my favorite Halloween movie several times between now and Halloween.

This is a favorite of my sister and I - for some reason we just love it and must watch every October.  It's fun and something you can watch with the kiddies, if you have any.

I think I mentioned last year, I have some black and orange Sugar n Cream floating around in my stash somewhere.  I never was able to track that down, otherwise I would have my own pattern posted here.  I will have to check again and if I find it see if I can come up with something quick.

I've been making an effort to finish up my UFO's that are lying around.  If you follow me on facebook, you may know that I finally joined the sleeves to my sweater a couple weekends ago!  Yay!  It was a lot less scary and much easier than I anticipated.  So, I now only have about 8 inches or so and it will be done!  I am a little apprehensive about doing the collar for some reason, but I am sure that will be like the sleeve fear - easier than expected!


I've also been thinking about breaking out the Kool-Aid and dying some yarn.  I have some Lion Brand Fisherman Wool that I'd like to dye some autumn colors - maybe brown, dark orange and orange-red.  I'd like to do that this coming weekend, if I have time.  I may need to do a Kool-Aid run to make sure I have enough of the flavors I need to get these colors.  I would like to try and get some deeper, richer colors this time than I have in the past.  I've heard coffee or tea will make a nice brown - I may have to do that in conjunction with the Kool-Aid.  Either way, I am excited - I love dying yarn!!

Well, fellow knitters, I am going to go and do some work on that sweater!  Here are a few pictures of where I am.  I will certainly be posting pictures once it's complete.  Hopefully by the end of this month!

This is the quite the order I wanted the pictures posted, but blogger is not cooperating and letting me arrange them how I'd like.  Until next time, Happy Knitting!

Sleeves with the underarm stitches on waste yarn to be seamed with the body later

Close up of the sleeve and body joined,  with the reserved stitches waiting to be seamed up later

Here is the body, with a portion of stitches reserved to be seamed with  the underarm of the sleeves later

This is just a close up of the body with the reserved stitches

This is a few rows after the sleeves have been joined