English style without dropping right needle

#1

I would like to improve the effiency of my method as I can tell that dropping the needle and moving my whole hand/arm will get tiresome. I’ve seen a couple short videos on youtube but really can’t figure out how they are holding the needle and moving their hand to “flick” the yarn. Does anyone have any tips or a better video than this one? She moves a little fast for me to really follow it.

I will play around with continental too… but part of my reason to learn was to have my mom help me learn things and she knits english and I want to be able to do it as she does when I get to more complicated things… if that makes any sense. lol

#2

I support the right needle with my left thumb and index finger and kind of skim my right hand along the needle to wrap the yarn. You can always pause and back up the videos to look at a movement again.

These videos are similar to how I knit, so maybe they will help –
Knitting english
YouTube - English Style knitting
YouTube - I’m a Thrower

#3

Ah, I think the first one may help. I didn’t think to tip in with my left hand. I couldn’t figure out how to get my right hand finger around the tip of the needle, but she sort of tips it in towards the yarn. That and I am working too far fromt he tips… probably a beginner thing of fearing it’ll all fall right off the needle lol. I’ve only been knitting for about 6-7 weeks. It makes me a little nervous, but I also figure now is the time to experiment before I get too ingrained in a method!

Thanks. Wish there was a slow mo option on youtube so you could slow videos down. lol it would help!

#4

Yep, I knit like this, too. It really gets to be quite fast when you get the hang of it.
Knitting english
YouTube - I’m a Thrower

If a project is [I]all[/I] ribbing then I knit continental however.

#5

I kind of slide my right hand up to the tip and flex open my index finger. I just took a couple pictures with my phone to show how I hold the needles in both hands, so I’ll see if I can figure out how to post them.

#6

Okay, let’s see if this works. One is how I balance the needles in my left hand, the other is where I move my right hand to wrap the stitch. I also put my right thumb along the needle which pushes it into my curled up right hand.



#7

Thanks for the pictures. :slight_smile: I’ll play with it as I knit the many squares in my daughter’s patchwork afghan. 11 down, 37 to go. lol Lot of garter stitch to practice these things. lol

#8

One of these days I’ll have my sweetie take a video of my knitting style so I have that to post.

Thanks Jan for including the link to How to Post Pictures in your sig. I knew where to look for the instructions! :wink:

#9

:teehee: You’re welcome!

#10

As far as working with your mother if you wanted to knit Continental… I don’t think that will be a problem, especially as you say, later on to do more complicated things. Continental and English are basically the same thing. They form the stitches the same way, wrap the yarn the same way (just accomplish it a little differently), and make stitches that are seated on the needles the same way, and there is very little that you would have trouble adapting. Most knitting books show the bare basics of Continental (if at all) and then just show the needles on how to do things beyond the basics and you just do the same thing as an English knitter, but hold the yarn differently. Once you are comfortable with the doing of it, the other stuff won’t be that hard to learn from your mom.

It is really nice to know both methods anyway. I like to use both at the same time for stranded knitting. If you understand both ways you will for sure have no problem adjusting things your mom does English to the Continental style.