One of my favorite parts about working with other knitters and crocheters is how much there is to learn! It seems that everyone has their own repertoire of tips and tricks that they have gathered from years of experience. That being said, this is exactly how this week's technique of the week came together! Kerin is always working on something, whether it be charity hats, pullovers, or complex colorwork sweaters. While knitting on a hat she had been making up, the converstion turned to the techniques of stranded colorwork, which led (obviously) to how one handles stranding three colors across the row at once! As usual, Kerin was nice enough to indulge my excitement and we created a video tutorial to share this technique with other colorwork obsessed knitters!
The video will show you a very simple technique that solves the potentially messy problem of working three colors across a row at one. Most colorwork patterns will have you alternate between stranding two colors across a row at once. However, if you have dabbled in designs that show off Icelandic and Scandinavian motifs, you might find this easy technique quite handy!
As you can tell on the motif that Kerin is knitting in the video, working three colors at once only happens every few rows. So you do get to enjoy a bit of a break and go back to your regularly schedule two color stranding in between the rows.
Have you tried stranding three colors at once? Or are you an adventurous knitter who has worked more than three at a time?
Feb 29, 2012 at 8:45 PM Thanks Jenny!! Love her imagination. :-)
Feb 29, 2012 at 12:06 PM Hi Andy! Unfortunately, there isn't an official pattern for this hat, just something Kerin came up with as she was playing around with different motifs as she knitted the hat.
Feb 29, 2012 at 10:29 AM I agree with Liz. Whenever I've done Latvian braids, the colors get tangled up. It seems from the video that this would happen here as well. Is there a way to avoid this?
Feb 28, 2012 at 5:53 PM What is the pattern Kerin is knitting?
Feb 28, 2012 at 5:37 PM One way to do colour work without floats is using this technique I learned from philosophers wool.com. Each second stitch in a colour(if there are 3+ stitches of that colour) is woven up into the back of the other colour. And it prevents twisting. I'll have to see if I can use this new technique too,
Feb 28, 2012 at 4:31 PM I have always twisted when only working with two colors so I don't get those jogs/floats in the back. I thought that was cleaner looking. Nice to see I wasn't crazy LOL I just get frustrated with twisting when they are twisted so much that you have to stop and untwist the two balls of yarn in order to go on to the next row. Is there a way to avoid this? or does that just come with the territory? Thanks for the video I understand so much better when I can just see what you are talking about instead of reading and rereading cause I don't get it LOL Thanks!
Feb 28, 2012 at 4:07 PM This is brilliant. I'm saving this in the "video library"!
Feb 28, 2012 at 2:23 PM ooh, thank you for this!!!