Measured Threads

Well, not my dog exactly,  my brother’s dog chewed a hole in the Christmas stocking I made for my nephew so I had to do surgery.

I threaded two smaller circular needles into the stitches above and below the hole to act as lifelines to prevent unraveling when I cut it in half (just like a tourniquet stops bleeding from a severed limb).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I cut out the whole section of knitting where the hole was.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I re-knit the section and grafted the two halves together.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All finished and almost as good as new.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also knit a stocking for his brother for his first Christmas last year that was not without its own problms.   No dog involved in that one, just a huge chart reading error on my part.  I always tell my students that the only reason I know how to fix mistakes is because I make them all the time.

Mistakes are a part of knitting.   You are, after all, making thousands of stitches for even small projects–there are at least 6,000 stitches in one adult sized sock and quite possibly more depending on your gauge and the size of the foot.  I don’t know anyone who is perfect enough not to make a mistake over that many stitches.    Some mistakes can be left in if they don’t affect the wear-ability or the stability of the  structure of the finished object.  Other times mistakes must be fixed, occasionally that includes ripping out and restarting, especially if the garment is not going to fit (gauge matters).  Most of the time, if I find a mistake in my work, I fix it, even if it is only a small cosmetic problem.   I will ruthlessly rip out just as I did in the sock in the previous post, when there is no other way to fix what is wrong.  Dropped stitches can be picked up, missed decreases/increases can be fixed even a few rows later without to much fuss and even mistakes in cables and lace can be fixed many rows later.  There is no harm in trying, the worst that can happen is that you mess up the fix and have to rip out part, or all and start over.

Here is a picture of a fix in process on a baby blanket I knit a few years ago.  I don’t remember the exact problem, but it was probably a misplaced yarn over or k2tog that I didn’t notice until I was about 6 rows past.  I knit over to the section of stitches where the error was, dropped down the 11 stitches in that repeat of the pattern to the row where I needed to make the correction, picked them up on a needle and then reknit each row of the repeat using the strands behind.    It’s easier to do something like this using needles a size smaller that what you were knitting the project with and a circular needle or dpn so that you can do all the work on the right side by sliding the needles back and forth.

Want to see another?

This one was a problem in a feather and fan lace patterned blanket called the Hemlock Ring.  You can see the chart laying behind the project.  I had to drop about 40 stitches down 10 or 12 rows to fix this one.   It was actually a bit fun to do.  (I’m not sure what that says about me though).   Next time, we will talk about taking a scissors to the knitting in order to fix it.

These socks seemed like they were endless too. The yarn is Regia Galaxy and it looks like rings of Saturn if you get the correct gague when you knit. Needless to say, I worked hard to get the correct gauge and when I didn’t see the rings forming to my satisfaction, I would rip all or parts and start again, either knitting more loosely or more tightly. It didn’t help that I changed dpn between socks since I didn’t like the 5 inch ones I was using, and even though I stayed on US size 0 needles, the change made a difference. Finally though I am ready to take out the waste yarn and knit the afterhthought heel. Hopefully they will be finished soon.