Monday, October 1, 2012

Join, being careful not to twist

People are always asking how to fix a twist, after they are a few rows into a project...and often call it a moebius (it is not).  I once hear a suggestion of using pins or clips to pull e edge into the middle, while the work was laid flat on a table.   I've been suggesting that ever since, but last week I improved upon it!

I was making my second Woobie stuffie/blankie, and I remembered from last time how frustrating casting on that many stitches was.  I had the hardest time getting the number right, then making sure there was no twist.   It just took forever.   This time, I had a clever idea.   First, I put a marker every fifty stitches, triple checking the numbers between markers (I still managed to mess that up, but wht can you do?).  Then I put a safety pin every 6 inches or so into the very edge of the cast on edge...into the knotty bits under the cast on.  (I cast on in long tail with waste yarn, to be clipped off, later, as a provisional cast on).   Then, before joining, I threaded a bit of waste yarn though each safety pin, and pulled them all to the Center and tied it into a circle, making sure that the work was untwisted.   This made it all much easier to see if the work was trying to twist!

It still looked twisted around the needle, until I got a few inches done, but once I had made sure that there were no twists, the inner circle wouldn't let the sts twist all the way around.   It worked great!

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