Getting started with knitting is more simple than one might think. Like many things, knitting can be done in a variety of ways. This is how my grandmother taught me.
I’ll include a few links to short videos I did about a year ago that will get you started knitting if you’ve never picked up knitting needles before. Below is a description of how to get started on a simple yet beautiful cotton dishcloth.
The videos are short and easily paused, reversed, etc., to help you along.
https://odysee.com/@Boudica:b/knitting-lesson-part-two:a
The dishcloth starts with a 5-stitch cast on. From here, you’ll knit the following:
- knit two stitches, place the working yarn in the front of your work and knit the next stitch as normal. This will result in a 1-stitch increase and is called a yarn over. Knit the remaining stitches.
- Repeat the above instructions, increasing the amount of stitches by 1 for each row. The yarn over will produce a decorative hole.
- Once you have reached 50 stitches on your needle you will start to decrease each row. This is done as follows: knit the first 2 stitches, and place the yarn in the front of your work to complete the yarn over. The next two stitches will be knit together so that two stitches become one stitch.
- Repeat the above instruction until you are back to 5 stitches. Then you will ‘bind off’.
To bind off, or finish your knitting, you’ll knit the first two stitches, then slip the first stitch you knit over the second and off the needle. Knit the next stitch and slip the ‘first’ stitch over the ‘second’ and off the needle. Repeat until you only have one stitch left. Break or cut your yarn about 2 to 3 inches away and pull through your last stitch.
Your knitting is now complete and you have a beautiful, hand-made, artisanal dishcloth.
Happy knitting.
Northern Volkstead
Homesteading in the mid-west, working towards self-reliance and self-sufficiency