Next-Level Knitting: Cables

1. Introduction to Next Level Knitting by Angela Hahn: hi. You and office later would like to learn some new skills that can take your needing to the next level. Are you ready to move on from wash plus scars to Cowell's hats and even sweaters? My name is Angela Hot, and I've been designing patterns for knitting for about 10 years. Now you can find my designs in magazines like Interweave Movement, yet seen online at Love, Knitting, Twist Collective and Travel Re and also on my website attitude dot com. From a design perspective, it's pretty tough to create a knitting pattern without using at least a few intermediate skills, such as shaping using increases in deep pieces or stitch patterns like cables, lace for finishing techniques such as sewing seams and adding edge ings. And from another's perspective, it's just a lot more interesting and fun when you've mastered some of these intermediate skills. Luckily, if you already know have to cast on stitches how to net and have to pearl and how to bind off stitches, and you've already tackled some of nothing's biggest challenges, the next steps are easy in comparison. As a beginner novice knitter, your project options are pretty limited. But as an intermediate knitter, practically endless. So where to begin? I've decided to focus first on cables because they're always popular. They're beautiful, they're fun. And I promise you there easier. We're going to dive right into cable knit, making, cabled sampler cow that uses several different types of cables I don't want the same exact technique is used for each one, so let's get started. 2. Knitted Cables: What, How and Why: Hello and welcome back in this lesson, I'm going to talk about a few different types of cables and how they're made. This 1st 1 is a very simple, twisted cable of six stitches, three stitches that are crossed over three and it is eight rows between crosses. You can see this eight rows there. So to do this, you need to hold some stitches and keep them behind your work while you work. The other stitches, which are the ones that crossover in the front. So this is called a right cross because the stitches go from left to right, the ones that are on the front and you can see that on every cross. The cross goes from left to right, which is what makes this a twisted cable. Now, this next cable is very similar. It also has eight rows between crosses, but it has four stitches which are crossed over four, and so it has a sort of a fatter, thicker look to it. This next cable is a very interesting one. This is the centerpiece of our cabled sampler cowl, and this is a braided or plaited cable. It includes crosses both to the right and to the left, and it's a total of 12 stitches. So this is one of the right crosses, like the ones we just saw, where stitches air held behind the work, the next ditches air worked, and that creates the crossover. This next cross is a left cross because the stitches in the front go from right to left, so they go in the direction of left. And to do this, you need to hold the stitches in front of your work, knit the stitches that go behind, and then you work the stitches that are held in front. This next cable is one that you may have seen on many fishermen or Aaron sweaters. This is called a honey comb cable. This is really too small cables next to each other. They're mirror images, and they are two stitches crossed over another two stitches. But the same to Stitch column always stays on top, creating this serpentine line, and then on the other side, the crosses go in the opposite direction, making this kind of circle effect for the honeycombs. This cable is a very interesting one. This is once again simply four stitches crossed over four, but It's not for knit stitches. It's knit Purl Purl net, and then the same stitches are on the bottom knit Purl Purl net. And so when you cross those over, you get this very interesting ribbed effect, and it looks more complicated than it is. It's really to once again to mirror image cables on the left side. He crosses to the left and then on the right side, the crosses to the right. This is very similar. If you see out just the right side, it's the exact same cross, but it looks very different with the ribbing. This is another interesting cable. This is a cross of one stitch over two stitches, so it's an asymmetrical cross goes to the right on this side. Then you can see that there's three crosses in a row. They happen on each right side row, and then same thing on the left. On the same row, one stitches crossed over two stitches going to the left. In the center. This strand of yarn goes between the stitches that are crossed in opposite directions. There's some tension on these stitches because of this, which makes it a little more challenging to work this cable than the simple, basic twisted cable that I showed you first. Okay, now we've talked about the what and how of cables, and now we're going to talk about the why why learned toe work cables? Because you can use them in so many different project in such fun ways, you could start out with something like this, which is a simple, twisted cable that is angled toe the left using increases and decreases. It's a capel. It worked in the round, and it's for a child, so it works out quite quickly. Another type of quick project you could do with cables is a hat. Both of these hats are worked in heavyweight or bulky yarns, and both of them used the cables that include both knit and Purl. Stitch is similar to the one that I showed you earlier. Once you're ready to move on to a larger projects such as a sweater, you could do something like the one on the right, which just uses a small cable as an accent. Or you could tackle a project like the one on the left, which is an example of a fisherman or Aaron type sweater and includes several different types of cables. Some of these can be very complicated. And then finally, we have two examples of more complicated cable projects. The men's on the left have multiple intertwining cables, while the rap on the right has four different types of cables, some of which are fairly complicated and all together give a very rich and textured appearance to the fabric. Now these masses of cables may look intimidating, but really, the main difference between these and the cabled sampler cow that you'll be working on is keeping track of all those many cable twists and turns. So let's take a look next at our cabled sampler cowl and learn how to do those simple cable twists. And soon enough, you'll be on your way to doing more complicated cable projects. 3. Class Project: The Cabled Sampler Cowl: and this is what you will be working on in this class. The class project is a cabled sampler Cowl. As you can see, it has several different types of cables. This one here is the right twist cable, and then in the center is the plated or braided cable. And on the left we have the left twist cable. Now, if you flipped the cowl over, you will see that the other side is identical, so front and back are exactly the same. In between the cabled panels, we have panels of seed stitch, which is alternating pearl and knit stitches, so we will also learn how to do those during this class. Included with this class is a written pattern in which I will tell you how to customize the cable by making it shorter or by making it medium length. One more repeat of the twisted cables or full length like you see here, which is a great height if you want to scrunch it up or pull it up over your face for extra warmth. Now this is an interesting twist. If you turn the cowl inside out, you have a very unusual textured surface. The seed stitch panels look about the same, but the pearled columns now become net columns, and the cables become these interesting pearl annals with dimpled surfaces. So now we will go back to the right side of our cowl, and I'll show you another way that you can change the look a little bit. You can wear the cowl with the braided or plaited panels on the sides on the left and right twist cables in the front and the back. Here is the left twist, and here's the right twist cable. Now that we've had a good look at our finished class project, we're going to go back to the beginning. We'll talk about the materials and the tools that you'll need. We'll also go over the skills that are required, including casting on working in the round, moving the yarn back and forth between front and back so that we can work knit and Purl stitches. And I will also go over the written pattern with you to make sure they understand all of the instructions. I'm really looking forward to showing you exactly how cabling is done 4. Materials: Hello again. In this lesson, we're going to talk about materials starting with their tools. These are both circular needles there. Two examples. The silver ones are a little bit larger than the other ones, and these have a very flexible cable connecting the two needle ends. Now the life of a circular needle is important. This one is about 24 inches long, measured from needle tip to needle tip, as I'm showing you here, and this is a good length for our cowl project. Although the circumference of the cowl is just under 24 inches when it's not stretched, it easily stretches to quite a bit more than that, so it will fit well on this. On this needle, this needle has a much longer cable, and it's also a much stiffer cable. This is an older needle that I picked up a while ago, and this cable makes it kind of tricky to work with because it tends to keep wanting to kink. It's also too long for our project. As you can see, this needle is a total of about 32 inches from tip to tip, which means that it will it will be too long for the cow that we're going to make now. The next tools that I'm going to show you our stitch markers. It's good to have a variety of colors to help you set apart different parts of your knitting. So here I have some black rubber markers, some different colored plastic markers. You can buy these at any knitting store or a lot of selling notion stores and these air removable. This one is actually a removable stitch marker. It's really a safety pin, but it has a plane loop on one end. It does not have the extra loop on the normal safety pin that I'm showing you here and do not want to use a normal safety pin as a marker because that loop will get caught on your yard and snag it. Next, our cable needles. They come in several different shapes and sizes, and it really depends on which which shape you prefer. You can try a couple of different ones. They hang from your work when they're holding the held stitches for the cable, and they have this section in the center that helps keep those dishes secure. This last one that I'm showing you is Ah is a large and bulky sized one, which is the same Size is Air Needle, however, are knitting Needle, but it's quite heavy because it's metal. So I'm actually going to use one of these smaller needles when I start working on our class project. This is a double pointed needle, which in a pinch you can use to hold stitches for a cable. But it's rather unwieldy and impractical to use. So especially when you're starting out with cable knitting, it's important to have the proper tools, these air tapestry needles. You can see that they have a large I, which makes it easier to pass the yarn through it. And they come in both plastic and in metal and in different sizes in different lengths. So once again, you need to decide which works best for you and which size is is easy to use with the thickness of the yarn that you've chosen. Now we're going to talk about yarn. Here is a photo of a yard that you do not want to use for your first cable project. As beautiful as it is, it has several things wrong with it. First of all. It's kind of fuzzy, which is going to make it harder to keep your stitches separated. They tend to be bunched together on the needle when you're doing your cable crosses, so any fuzziness is going toe, make it harder to keep the stitches separate. In addition, this yarn has a lot of thick and thin sections and a lot of color variation. While some mild color vary, Gatien in your urine is fine and can be very pretty. Too much caller variation and too much texture in the yard are actually going to make it harder to see the outlines of your cables. So let's talk about yarn thickness or wait for a minute. Yarns range from threadlike to rope like with many different thicknesses in between and the in between. Thicknesses are the ones that are going to work best for a beginner cable project because they're not so thick that it's difficult to actually physically do the cable crosses. And they're not so thin that it's hard to see the stitches or takes a very long time to complete your project. So the best weights Ah, in my opinion, are the bulky weights for this type of project, and that's what we're going to be using for this cowl. This chart here is published by the Craft Yarn Council and is a reference point for all of the different yard weights that you'll see in the In the Yarn Store. Now we're going to talk about some yards that range from okay to better to best choices for our our class project. They're all the proper weight for the cable sampler cow. This one here is a single ply own, and it has a little bit of funds to it. It also tends to split fairly easily with a needle. Because of that lack of twist. This yarn, his two plies twisted together. You can see the twists quite easily because they're loose and this year and also has a bit of a fuzz to it. So it's not really going to be that much easier to use than the single ply yarn in terms of splitting with your knitting needle. This is the yarn that I actually decided to use for a cabled sampler cowl and I will give you the names of all of the yarns in your written instructions, but this one has a fairly tight twist to it. It has a nice soft texture, and it's very easy to work with. These next two yards are also excellent choices. This one has a very tight twist to it. If you compare it to the yard that I just showed you the arm that I have chosen to use for my version of our class project. This light green yarn also has a nice sheen to it, which is very pretty. This final yarn is tightly twisted once again, which will help keep you from splitting it accidentally with your needle. It's also a fairly light in color, as are all of these yarns. You don't want to choose a very dark colored yarn for your first cable project because the dark caller will make it more difficult to see your stitches. This is a screenshot of the page from the website for a quince and company yarn for Osprey yarn, which is what I used for the sample for the cabled Santa cow. It shows the color, which is bird's egg, and as you can see, there's multiple other colors. Now there are many other yarns that would be suitable, so if you already have a yard that's a bulky weight yarn, then certainly feel free to use it as long as you have enough of it. Be sure to check. The resource is for this class because there's a pdf version of the pattern, which tells you exactly how much yarn you need, what size needles you need. And there's also a list of recommended brands of needles as well as a number of different yarn choices, including some non wool ones, because the cow will be worn around your neck. So if you're sensitive to wolf and you might want to choose a cotton or synthetic blend, and for the next lesson, you will need your needle and your yarn because we're going to cast on and get started on our class project. 5. Casting on and working in the round!: Finally, we're going to cast on for a class project. I'm going to review the long tail cast on with you. And after we have all our stitches, Castan will also take a look at the written pattern so that you'll know how to read that for reference. So what I'm doing here is measuring out approximately three times the length of our finished cow, which is about 24 inches. So I'm measuring out six of these 12 inch rulers That should give us enough yard for the long tail for the long tail cast on. So here's where we're making the slip knot. Ah, you may have learned a different way to do this, but this is the way my mother taught me. I'm you make sort of a pretzel of the yarn and pull the tail through. And then if you slide the needle under this arm of the pretzel and pull the ends, you have your slipknot bend. Then here we are just casting on the first few stitches. Um, once again, if you have not learned how to do the long tail cast on, you might be able to pick it up here, or you might want to use a different reference to show you how to do this. So here what I'm doing is I'm counting the number of stitches I've cast on, and I see that for the first section, which should be eight stitches. I actually have one too many, so you can slide a stitch off the needle just like I did. And now I've placed the marker that marks the first cable section. So, as you can see, the ring marker is just slid off over the needle and rests in between the stitches. It's not actually put into the knitting but sits on the needle in between the stitches of each row around. So I've cast on another seven stitches here. That's going to be one of the seeds ditch in Pearl columns. So I placed a marker of my second caller, and that marker is going to mark the beginning of the next cabled panel. Now, in the interest of time, I'm going to skip ahead to where we have all of these stitches cast on. But we'll go over the number of stitches that need to be in each section very carefully. So here is the beginning of the cast on. And as you can see, there's the eight stitches for the right twist cable set off by the blue marker. And then we have the seven stitches for the seed stitch panel. Here's the 12 stitches for these plated cable, another seed stitch panel between the two different colored markers and then the left twist cable between the two yellow markers. Eight stitches again, another seed stitch panel of seven stitches. And then here is the second half of the cowl, where we have the eight stitch right twist cable once again another seed stitch panel between the red markers, the plated cable of 12 stitches and then between the two different colored markers and other seed stitch panel, the left twist cable. And then we have our final seed stitch panel here. And so what I'm going to do at this point is I'm going to join the stitches to work in the round. Now. When you do this, it's very important to make sure that the stitches are twisted. And the easiest way to do this on a project that's not too big like this cowl is to rotate the stitches so that the the braided sort of cord that goes at the bottom is on the inside of the ring of the circular needle and that where you can easily see where that whether there's a twist. Now I'm going to place the marker for my end and beginning of the round. And then, since the first stitch of the round is a knit stitch, I'm going to use both the long tail and my working yarn to make that first stitch that I'm going to drop the end of the tail and use only the working yard to continue with the first row of my right twist cable, which is simply knitted. So I'm going to net thes 1st 8 stitches. And once I come to the marker, which marks the end of the cable, I'm simply going to slip that marker from the left needle to the right needle. Now the next stitch is going to be pearl, which means I have to pass the yarn under the needle to make a Purl stitch. I can do this before or after I slipped the marker. It doesn't matter. So here I'm needing, actually in pearling. Um, the 1st 2 stitches of the Seed Stitch and Pearl column. And then the first row of the seed stitch in Pearl column is to Pearl's, followed by a net and then a pearl. Make sure the young goes under the needle and not over under the needle for another net stitch and then two more Purl stitches. Now each seed stitch column is going to be exactly the same. So you're going to repeat that every time you come to a section, which is between two different colored markers. So once again, I have slipped the marker from the left needle to the right needle, and now I'm going to begin the 12 knit stitches of the plated cable. Now, before we go any further, we're going to switch gears a little bit. And in the next lesson, we'll take a look at the written pattern and the charts so you can decide whether you prefer to use charts or written instructions or both 6. Cabled Sampler Cowl pattern and charts: Okay, now that we've completed our cast on including placing different colored markers to help us keep track of the different cable patterns, I'm going to go over the written pattern with you. There's a lot of information here, so we'll start at the beginning. First, there's an introduction. What you see here, This describes the cowl how it's constructed. It's worked in the round from the bottom up, and it tells you the instructions are both in, charted and written for. So on page two, we'll also take a look at the charts. The next section use you the finished size. Um, for something like this project, it's an approximate circumference and height, and if it happens to be a little bit bigger or a little bit smaller, it's probably not going to make much difference. The next section tells you the materials that you'll need, Um, and once again, we already have our yard, and we've already talked about yarn choices. So this is just for reference. If you were just going to use this pattern without, um, for instance, without going along with a class that gives you the needle sizes that you need and also or they're called the notions that stitch markers the needle so that you can weave in the ends when you're finished, etcetera. The next section is Gage. This is very important for something that needs to fit properly, like a sweater. But once again for something like a cow, I wouldn't worry too much about this unless you know that you tend in it either very tightly or very loosely, In which case you you might want to do a gauge swatch just to make sure that the cowl is not going to be much bigger or larger than you're expecting. Now this section here, the special stitches. This actually gives you instructions on how to work each cable pattern, so the 1st 1 is the right twist Cable. The 2nd 1 is a left twist cable, and then we have the plated cable and the seeds, ditch and curl columns. So this gives you a row by row description of how to do each pattern, and you'll notice that most of the rows are just plain knitting for the cables. So it's only on every eight throw that you need to do a cable cross. This is nice because it means you can relax a little bit in between those cable crosses and do some fairly mindless knitting as long as you keep an eye on what you're doing, so that you so that you maintain the seed stitch in the pearl columns. In between the cable columns appear. This gives the cast on directions. Now. This might look a little bit confusing because we have different colored markers that were placing, and we're casting on small numbers of stitches and placing the markers rather than casting on the total of 98 stitches without any markers. This is a little bit more complicated during the cast on, but it helps you keep track of the number of stitches much more easily. There's nothing more than an annoying than casting on a lot of stitches, starting to knit and then realizing that you have the wrong number of stitches. So it's always worth counting your cast on stitches a couple of times to make sure that you have the right number before you start to work. The next section talks about establishing the cable patterns and so this tells you which cable patterns you're going to work in each section in most written patterns after the after the first couple of Rosa rounds have established the patterns, then you'll see exception. Where it says to continue, the patterns is established. And so this is the part where you will need to keep some count of your of your rose in your route or your rounds. And in the in the next video lesson, we'll talk about how best to do that. So I'm going to move on to the second page. Just a quick word here about abbreviations. Most patterns will have some abbreviations of terms that are commonly used, so make sure you check this section so that you so that you know how to read the instructions. Okay, we're going to go on to Page two, which is three charts now. Many that is fine charts intimidating. But the nice thing about them is that they actually give you a picture of the knitting that you're going to be doing. And they also let you look ahead and see what's coming next in the the rounds that follow the one that you're working on and you can see when you look at the charts next to the photo of the finished cowl, and it gives a fairly good representation of what the cow looks like. It shows the right twist cable, but you see here on the photo the seed stitch and pearl columns in between the cables and the plated cable in the center, generally with the knitting chart. You started the bottom row and you work up because that's how your work progresses is unit . And if you're working in the round, then you start on the right hand side of the chart and read to the and read to the left. Because once again, that's how you work across the stitches on the needle. No, In this case, I've separated the charts into sections corresponding to the cables and the seed stitch pearl columns. Sometimes you might see all of the different stitch patterns, um, put into one continuous chart. But I felt that since we're keeping track of our different cables with markers, that it would make more sense to have the same number of stitches between the markers that you have in each chart. So here we have the right twist cable with eight stitches. The seed Stitch Pearl column with seven The plated Campbell with 12. Another scene Stitch Pearl COLUMN, The left Twist cable with eight and then the third seed Stitch Pearl column. And then you would repeat the same sequence for the second or the back half of the Cao Um, you can also see here that I show the 16 rows of the plane it cable when you finish the 16th road. Then you go back and start on Row one of the stitch pattern and because the because the plated cable is 16 rows high. What I did was show to repeats of the right twist and the left Twist cables, which are 88 rows high, and eight repeats of the seed stitch and pro columns. Because that's just a two road repeat, just to make the charts a little visually, a little bit easier to read and to use. Now, it's very important that you look at the key whenever you're using a chart. In this case, the white stitches air net and the gray stitches, Air Pearl and the right and left twist rose have been color coded to make them a little bit easier to see without the different colors they can actually look quite similar if you're glancing at the chart quickly, and you can also see once again that most of the rows of the cables are just plain knitting , Um, during which you can relax a little bit and take a break from the hard work of doing the cable crosses. 7. Establish cable patterns: Okay, We're back to a class project and we've completed the first round. Um, and what we've done is we've actually knit every stitch of the cable panels. And then we've done the same pearl to knit one Purl, one knit one and then pearl. Two more for each of the seeds. Dejan Pearl columns. So now I'm going to show you how to enter the second round of your knitting. So here we're just completing that last seed stitch and Pearl column with two Purl stitches . Slip the beginning of round marker. Now, remember, this first ditch has both the long tail and the working earning it, so we're going to snit both of those loops together. We only want one stitch there, and then we're going to go on and net the second round of our right twist cable, which is going to be all knit stitches. As you can see here hand Now, the second row of the seed, stitch and cable pattern is going to be slightly different. So remember that the 1st 2 stitches will always be pearl, but then the middle three stitches will alternate. So for the middle three stitches if the stitch in the last row is in net stitch, then you pearl it and vice versa. So we pearl and then net and then pearl instead of Nick Pearl net, and we'll alternate those two roads. These last two stitches once again are always Purl stitches. So here you can see that the seed stitch pattern is starting to take shape in those middle three stitches with alternating knit and Purl stitches. And so, after we slipped this red marker, we're going to to work the second row of our plated cable pattern. So I'm just going to work a few stitches here to make sure after the marker to make sure that the markers held securely in place, and now we'll just go and review all of the different cable patterns that we have. So those 1st 8 stitches are for the right twist. Cable. They're all net. We've got our seeds ditch and Pearl column, and then between the red markers, we have the plated cable pattern. Remember, there's one on the front, and one on the back between the yellow markers are going to be our left twist cables. And once again it's one on the front and one on the back. We have another seed stitch in Pearl column, and then we start again with a right twist. Cable between the blue markers, seeds, ditch and pearl, the plated cable between the Red Markers Seed stitch in Pearl and then finally, the second left twist cable and one more seed stitch in Pearl section to complete our round , So all of our patterns have been established. 8. Cable Cross: Right!: Yea, we're finally ready to do our first cable cross. It's going to be a right cross or twist where the stitches go from. Left to right across are the stitches as this in the swatch that I showed you earlier, and there's also going to be a right cable cross that we will work as part of the plated cable. As you can see in this, watch the left cross. We're not actually going to work until another eight rounds from now. So we are on the eighth round after the cast on. And it's important when you're doing cables that you can count the number of rounds between cables so that the twists are uniformly spaced. I'm going to show you a couple of different ways to keep track of how many rounds you've worked. Um, first of all, we can use our seed stitch column. You can see it's taking shape here nicely and the Purl stitches air alternating back and forth. 1234 567 So you know that the next round that we work will be our eighth round. You can also do it here. Don't count that first sich. That's the cast on. But then, if you count each V of the nits ditch, you will get to seven, which is the one on the needle itself, so that you know that the next round is going to be your eighth round. So we've passed the beginning of round marker from the left to right needle tip, and we'll just need to pay attention a little bit to make sure that that marker doesn't fall off. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to slip the 1st 4 stitches one by one onto my cable needle and then slide the cable needle so that the stitches Aaron that center bar, which helps keep them in place. You hold the needle, the cable needle in the back of your work and then unit the next four stitches. And this is what creates the right cross. An easy way to remember this. Yes, if you think of the phrase, I'll be right back. So when you hold stitches to the back, you will create a right cable cross. Now we need to work for stitches that we've held, and there's two ways to do this. You can actually knit them right off of your cable needle, which is what I'm doing here. I'm using my fingers to hold the stitches to make sure they don't slip off of the cable needle, because, um, there's some tension on them as I'm as I'm pulling them to work them. Another important thing is to not work thes stitches too tightly because it makes the cable crosses that much more difficult to do. And now we have our first cable cross completed. So I'm going to go on to our seed stitch and cable panel. Know what I've done is I've moved the marker because now that my cable panel is established , I don't feel I need the marker there anymore. And I've moved it toe either side of the three seed stitches in the middle of the seed stitch in Pearl column because it helps me to remember that I need to alternate those stitches with every row so you can decide whether you want to leave the markers in place to mark the cable panels, whether you want to mark the seed stitch panels or whether you even want to just remove them and not and not used them anymore because They are a little bit of a pain to pass back and forth between your natal tips every time you go, um, around the needle. So we're going to repeat that same cable again. This is now part of our plated cable, and I'm using a different type of cable needle. Justus Good is the other one. It really depends on your preference. It's a little bit smaller than the knitting needles, as you can see, but that's not really a problem, because the stitches air held pretty securely on a center loop of the cable. Neil. So I've gone on to knit the 2nd 4 stitches of my plated cable pattern, and now what I'm going to do is, instead of knitting the stitches right from the cable needle, I'm going to carefully slide them back. I'm to my left needle tip one by one. Did you see here? Take care not to drop them, And then I will knit these four stitches once again using my fingertip to keep those stitches from pulling off the tip of the needle before I have a chance to knit them. So it's always good to make sure you have four. The stitches get get bunched together on the needle, and it can sometimes be easy to knit two together at once or to miss one. So the last four stitches of the plated cable are just plain net for this round. This is round number eight of all of our cable patterns. And there you have it, too, right? Cable crosses. In our next lesson, we will tackle the left cable cross. And hey, don't forget to upload your work in progress to the class Project page and don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions. 9. Cable Cross: Left!: Now it's time to learn the left cable cross. Here's our left twist cable panels ready to go ahead and do the cross row. We've just finished the right cable twist on the 1st 2 cable panels, and here I've left the markers or the left twist cable so you can see if you decide to leave the markers. What you do is you pass the marker to the right hand needle, and then you go ahead and use your cable needle to slip the 1st 4 stitches of the cable. Two year to your cable needles. But you hold it in front of the world time. Well, that in front of the work, make sure you pass the aren't under the needle from the Purl stitch to the first knit stitch of the cable Smithies. Four stitches. Now you pull the yarn fairly tight when unit that first dish. But don't worry if there's a little bit of a space between that last Purl stitch in the first minutes. So now I'm going to carefully kind of rotate the cable needle and slide it back so that I can slip. The four held stitches back onto the left hand needle using my finger to keep them from popping off that needle tip because they will slide off pretty easily and then very carefully, net the first full of stitches of the left twist and the last couple of stitches. Make sure we have four stitches there, and that's it. We've done the left twist, and I'm just going to work. The 1st 2 stitches of the next sees Stitch and Pearl column toe. Hold that last marker in place while we go back and check our work. So when I finished this column that I will have done the front half of the cowl, and then I will repeat exactly what I did for the first half for the second half. And then what I'm going to need to Dio is to work another seven rows of our patterns. So another seven rounds to get to the next cable cross row, which will include a left twist for the plated cable. I've placed a removable stitch marker in the row that I worked the last cable cross on, and I'm counting up to the row that is on the needles right now. Remember, when you do a cable cost every eight throw doesn't mean there's eight rows between crosses . It means that the cross falls on every eight throw who is actually seven rows between each crossroad. So we're just going to review the right cable. Cross here quickly. If you don't need to see this, you can always fast forward to our review of the left cable crossroad. But once again, I'm going to take the 1st 4 stitches, hold them to the back of the work. I'm a cable needle now. I neglected toe move them to the center bar of that cable needle, so it makes it a little bit easier for them to slip accidentally off the cable needle. So I would recommend that when you do this, you make sure that you slipped those four stitches right to the center of that cable needle . I'm not going to place the stitches back on the needle tip on the left needle tip. Once again, those stitches air held to the back for a right cross. And then I'm going to work those four stitches using my fingertip to make sure that the stitches don't slip off of that left needle tip. And now you see that we're starting to see that nice, twisted cable because we have to cable Crossroads finished. I'm going to work across our, um, Purl stitch and Seed Stitch panel. Remember, when you're passing the yarn from front to back or back to front, always go under the needles or you'll accidentally create an extra stitch if you pass the yard over the needle by accident. So now we're at our plated cable. And for this second twist, which is rose 16 of the pattern, the 1st 4 stitches are just net. So that's what I'm doing here. And then the next four stitches will form the beginning of our left cable cross. So I'm going to use the cable needle and hold it to the front of my work to make a left cross. I'm going to go ahead and net the next four stitches once again, not worrying if there's a little bit of a space between the fourth stitch that I had just done plain knitting and then the first of the four stitches that form part of the cable. So I'm now going to take those stitches and knit them right off of the cable needle and this will complete a left cable cross, and there we have it. Now we're starting to see our plated cable taking shape, and we'll go on to work the Seed stitch and Purl stitch column Because now that we're on the 16th round of our cowl, we actually have another left twist to Dio. So remember, for the plated cable with alternate right and left cable crosses and then for the single cable on either side, it's the same cross every four rows. Oh, it looks like I dropped a stitch somehow, so I just picked that up and put it back on my needle. Um, it's always good. Teoh. Keep track of how many stitches you should have so that if you have one missing, you'll notice quickly before it before it creates a run too far down in your knitting. So I'm going to once again take four of the stitches for the cable. Hold them to the front. I'm using this other shape of cable needle. Let's more of a hook shape. No, no, the next four stitches of the cable and then carefully past the stitches from the cable needle one at a time. Back on to the left needle tip. Make sure they don't slip off accidentally. Now, you should take a look at the video after this because I'm going to show you how to fix some mistakes that happen often like, for instance, of those stitches do fall off of that cable needle. Don't panic. It can be fixed. So now we've finished our second left cable cross, and you can see that twist taking shape now in our left twist cable. And once I finished this seed stitch in Pearl column, I will be halfway through the 16th round of our cowl. I'll repeat what I just did for the second half of this round, and then we will have finished 16 rounds or one full repeat of the plated cable and two full repeats of the two side cables. 10. Dropped stitches? Don't panic!: Okay, Now that you've learned how to do both a front or left cable cross and a back or right cable cross, I'm going to show you what to do if the cross does not go a smoothly as you would hope. And I'm going to use this swatch of the plated cable to demonstrate. So here I am, doing the front or left cross. I've got the four stitches held in front of the work hand. I'm now going to take the stitches from the cable needles. Place them back on the left hand needle. Now, remember, I've kept my finger there to keep these stitches from popping off that needle. And that's why because they actually will come off very easily. But as you can see, we're not going anywhere. They're sitting right there so you can just very calmly use your left needle tip and put those four stitches back onto it and then go ahead and work them as if nothing had happened . Even if you have one stitch left one or two stitches and it comes off, it's not going to tend to pull out, so you can just take your time. Put it back on the needle and then work it as usual If the same thing should happen while you're doing a back or right across and just do exactly the same thing. Now, here, I'm going to show you what happens if you drop a stitch on the row after you've made the cable cross. Because TheStreet itches that were crossed have a lot of tension on them. Sometimes it's hard to see them. They can be very tight, too close together. And sometimes you might pull one out accidentally, which is what I tried to show you here. So the the this is the stitch that was in the row below, and this loop is the stitch that was dropped. So to pick that up again, you want to put it over the needle and then pull the stitch that was in the row below, which is this one? Pull it over that loop that restores the stitch that you dropped, and then you can go ahead and work. It is usual. So here I'll show you again. That stitch can actually pop out fairly easily if you if you yank on it. Um so take thes stitch from the row below and put it on your needle before it goes any further down. And then take the loop. That that is the dropped stitch past the stitch from the road below over that loop and your stitches back, and then you can continue to work as usual. Now it's never a bad idea once you've completed the row after the cable cross to count the stitches in the cable and make sure they're all there, because at this point they should be pretty easy to see. So make sure you have your 12 stitches, and now this is also a good time to place your removable marker to mark the cable crossroad . It's going to be the road just to below the stitches that are on the needle, and it's much easier to mark at this point in trying to get a stay stitch marker through the stitch while it is still on the needle. 11. BInding off and finishing your cowl: well, here I am wearing the short version of our cabled sampler cowl. As you can see, it doesn't scrunch as much as the taller version, but still tall enough to cover that area from the top of your chest up to your chin. So if you decided to do the short version, then at the time that we had finished our left cable cross lesson, you would already have been halfway done because that was 16 rounds. After that, you would do another 15 rounds just the same as you did the first, um, 15. And then rather than do a final cable cross, what we're going to do is bind off our stitches if you decide to do a taller cowl than you would continue to work until you have completed the correct number of rounds. But the bind off procedure would be exactly the same, and that's what we're going to do here. So I've just finished the end of my 31st round. I'm going to remove the stitch marker because I don't need it anymore, and now I'm going to start binding off, so we'll review this quickly. So I've knitted the 1st 2 stitches of that final round, and I'm going to pass the first stitch that I worked over the 2nd 1 I'm going to do the same thing. This leaves one stitch on the needle every time I pass the first titch over the 2nd 1 and each time one stitch is bound off. Now, remember to keep the the our intention fairly loose while you're binding off because you don't want to the bind off to be tight and stiff. You wanted to have some stretch and some elasticity to it. So we're going to bind off all of the cable stitches it wise, and then to bind off the Purl. Stitches were going to Pearl the stitch, and then what we have to do to pass the first stitch over the 2nd 1 is to reach around behind the work with their left hand needle and pull that first stitch over the 2nd 1 I'm going going to continue finding often patterns. So I'll Pearl. This next stitch is part of the seed stitch pattern. And then what I did here is past the yard to the back because I'm going to knit the next ditch, and that makes it easier to bind off this dish, so I'll show you that again. But here I'm pearling because I want to bind off in pattern. I have to pull that stitch over from the back because the next stitches another Purl stitch so the aren't stays in front. But here, since I'm going to pass the yard to the back to knit the next stitch, I'm going to do that before I bind off. And that just makes it a little easier to see what I'm doing when I can pull that first ditch over the second from the front rather than from the back. And so here we will go on finding off knit wise. Since we're now into our plated cable. That and I'm just checking here to make sure that everything is nice and stretchy. And so if you want to stop binding off in the middle of the process, just take that one stitch that's left on your right hand to needle. Put it on your left hand needle temporarily, and when you're ready to work again, just put that stitch back on your right hand needle and to continue to bind off. Okay, we've jumped ahead to the end of our bind off. I just have to stitches left one more stitch to bind off, plus the sticks that's on the right hand needle. So I'm going to show you a little trick to avoid creating what is essentially an extra stitch at the end of your bind off. So here I have my last stitch. I've already cut the yarn, and what you might have learned to do when you bind off is to pass this end of yarn through that last stitch. But what we're going to do instead is we're not to going to pass it through that loop. We're just going to pull the cut end of the yard out of that last bound off stitch, and then this creates a bound off round that's the same length has all of your other rounds . The regular method of finishing the bind off really creates an extra stitch, and what I've done is threat a tapestry needle with the tail, and now I'm passing it through the 1st 2 bound off stitch, and then I'm taking the yarn and passing it from top to bottom into the same stitch that the yarn came out of which really creates an unbroken line of stitches for our bind off round. Now here, I'm just going to show you how to weave that cut end in. So what I'm doing is taking the tapestry needle and just passing it through one leg of the some knit stitches on the wrong side of the work. Now these knit stitches on the right side are a column of Purl stitches. And so this strand of yarn that you're passing through the backs of those stitches is not going to show packed all on the right side. Now what you always want to do when you're weaving in your ends is to pass the yarn in several different directions so that it anchors Thea aren't securely and the yarn will not be able to work itself free. So this is my third pass changing directions with every pass, and on the last pass, I want to be heading away from the edge of the cowl so that the cut edge of the yarn will definitely not show above the finished edge. Now here's a photo of the tall version of the cowl, but I've also marked the heights of the short and medium versions on the photo. If you were to work the medium version of the cowl, then you would work for 39 rounds and bind off on the 40th round to work the tall version. You would work in pattern for 47 rounds and bind off on the 48th round of the cowl. 12. Conclusion: well that wraps up our class on cable knitting. Hopefully, at this point, you feel comfortable doing both left and right across cables and are ready to tackle a more complicated cable knitting project just to review. Here are the short and the tall versions of the cabled sampler cowl and here, as I showed you in one of our earlier lessons, is the inside out version of the cabled sampler cowl and another way to try wearing your class project. Don't forget to post your work in progress to the class Project page and stay tuned for more classes to come. Perhaps another class on more advanced cables or a class on your first lace knitting project, or perhaps even a class on your first sleeveless top knitting project.