Yarn on Thursday: Stitch Edition - Week Fourteen!

The project: Knitting all the stitches in KnittingOnTheNet.com's Stitch Directory.
The yarn: Anything you want. I'm using a Phentex "Monster Ball of Yarn" (32 oz. 100% acrylic), which won't block, but will give good stitch definition.
The needles: Again, whatever you want that goes with your yarn. I'm using my beloved Lantern Moon size 7s, because they're pretty.
Why this is happening: Because lots of people want to learn new stitches this year!

This week's stitches: #45 - Twin Rib, #46 - Two By Two Rib, #47 - Windmill and #48 - Woven Stitch.

First up, Twin Rib. It's a six stitch repeat, so I did six seed stitches, eighteen pattern stitches, then six more seed stitches per row. It's a two row pattern, so six vertical repeats was quite enough to let you see what's going on. There are six rows of seed stitch before the next swatch.




What I noticed about this pattern: It's a nice little rib variant, and is identical (from left to right) on both sides. Unlike a normal rib, though, it doesn't pull in on itself. I'd block it to line up the vertical columns of knit stitch (or purl stitch, depending on where you're looking at any given instant). The "obvious" curl in the photo isn't really there; I was just having a heck of a time getting a combination of "good light" and "flat surface", some of which depended on my sense of balance, late in the evening.

The Two by Two Rib is your classic bottom-of-a-sweater ribbing. It has a four stitch repeat (or "multiple of 4"+2). I opted for the plain four stitches, five times, for twenty pattern stitches flanked by five seed stitches per side. Again, it doesn't take long to get the idea behind this stitch, so I whipped up 20 rows pretty quickly. There are six rows of seed stitch before the next swatch.


What I noticed about this pattern: Tricks I learned from my TKGA classes: tug on the working yarn just a wee bit when switching from k to p and from p to k, and all the stitches line up and look lovely, without one column of stitches being obviously bigger/more spaced out than the ones next to it. But man, oh man - it pulls in, just like it's supposed to. (I even broke out the White Table background so you could see, clearly, just how much a k2p2 rib pulls in on itself!) Ribbing isn't usually blocked, but if you wanted the look without the pulling-in, you'd have to block pretty harshly!

Windmill is a wide one - twelve stitches, which means two repeats. So, I did three seed stitches, twenty-four pattern stitches, and three seed stitches per row. It's also a long one - fourteen rows per repeat, so I did two repeats over twenty-eight rows. There are six rows of seed stitch before the next swatch.


What I noticed about this pattern: It's triangles, with a twist! Boxed triangles, but rotated! I really like it. Failing to remember that there's two rows of p6/k6 between direction-switches lost me a row somewhere in the first repeat, but I compensated by finishing the swatch with only one row. So it's really over 26 rows, instead of 28, as it should be. (Give me enough Benadryl, and I'm unlikely to care if I've completely mucked up a pattern. Allergy season will end soon, right?

Finally, Woven Stitch is, I think, one of my newly-discovered favorites. It's a "(multiple of 4)+2" stitch, which means moving to four seed stitches before and after the pattern area. I did three vertical repeats of the pattern, since I liked it so much! There are six rows of seed stitch before the next swatch.


What I noticed about this pattern: Basketweave effect, without having to remember where the knit row goes. (You don't want to know how wonky I can make basketwork look if there's a really interesting bit on the telly.) It's easy to remember, and would make an interesting fill or all-over pattern. I may try to replace my first-ever actual basketweave sweater (long since donated in hopes someone it actually fits will find it) with a Woven Stitch sweater. It's easy. It lies flat. It's just wonderful!

This ends the first part of the master Stitch Pattern list. The next group of stitches will be *all* be reversible - there are 28 Reversible stitches on the list, but I've already covered all but seven of them! Of these seven, several are also on the Master List as "Unique" and others are "Lace". You'll see!

A note on the whole project: Since there are 139 stitch patterns (some are listed under multiple headings), plus 7 different edgings in KnittingOnTheNet.com's Stitch Directory, I'll be trying to do two to three stitches a week, minimum. This should get everyone a goodly number of new stitches by the end of the year, and hopefully get me a blanket. No worries if you "fall behind" or "start late" - this is for fun & education, there isn't *really* a time limit of any sort on it. If you're just discovering this project, this link will take you to the beginning, and this link will pull up all the related entries. Just knit on, and have fun!