The Knitting Fiend

I think ordinary ribbing looks a bit boring on a heavily cabled Aran sweater, so I decided to work the ribbing so the knit stitches are twisted on the outside. I did this by “knitting through the back loop”, which is one way to twist knit stitches. Because I was sort of lazy, I purled normally, so the back side is not twisted.
If you compare the two photos above, I think you can see the difference.

Knitting 1 x 1 ribbing went quickly. I was even able to concentrate on the plot of “Lost” while knitting. (That’s a change compared to working all the fancy cables.) I found myself binding off toward the end of the evening.

But, for the benefit of the beginning knitters who read my blog (and those who get here by typing “how to bind off ribbing” into Google, I saved the last bit of binding off and took photos. (Showing this also has the benefit of showing how I worked a “knit through the back loop”– that is how to work a “ktbl”.)

When binding off in ribbing, work the stitches “as they present themselves”. That is, if the stitch I am about to knit looks like a knit stitch, I knit just as I would if I were knitting a row of ribbing without binding off. Above, left, you can see I am inserting the tip of my right needle into the knit stitch on the left tip. If you examine carefully, you can see I placed the tip of the right hand needle to the right side of the right leg of the stitch. Then, I slid it in through the hole. This is called “knitting through the back loop” and abbreviated “ktbl”.

Notice, the stitch I am about to knit is twisted!

I then wrap over and knit the stitch. If you examine this stitch, it will be twisted. That’s what I want when I knit twisted rib!

After knitting this stitch, I have two stitches on the right tip. I insert the left tip into the right most stitch, see above right. Then I pull the right hand stitch over the other stitch, and drop it. There is now 1 stitch on the right tip.

Because I’m knitting 1 x 1 ribbing, the next stitch is a purl stitch. I bring the yarn back as to purl, and insert the needle to purl. As I mentioned, I was lazy and just purled these the normal way; that means I’m going to “purl through the front loop”. No one ever says that, since purling through the front loop is the normal way; you can see how the right tip goes through the stitch on the left tip above and to the left.

Once again I have two stitches on the right tip. So, I insert the left tip into the right hand stitch on the right needle, (see above right), lift it over and drop it.

I should mention, when beginning, you need to knit two stitches before binding off. After all, you need two stitches on the right tip before you can bind off. When you finish, you’ll have one stitch on the tip; I just break and pull the yarn through.

Lot’s of people posts questions about how to make the final bind off look good when knitting circular. I may show how I do that more detail sometime later; then you can decide if you like my method. But, I need to wait until I knit the collar, or cuffs, because I forgot to take pictures!

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This is filed with stitch patterns and Aran Knitting.