Help - diagonal knit square cloth ended up football shape

How-to Questions
1

Hello!

I’m a newbie here, several friends have pointed me to this site.

I learned to knit from this site and use the continental knit instructions.

I tried to make this dish cloth: Grandmother’s Favorite which builds the square on a diagonal using YO’s to increase and YO & K2tog to decrease.

Everything seemed to go fine except my finished product is nowhere near square.

I understand the idea of adjusting needle size to fit a gauge, but I think if I were to use smaller or larger needles I would just get a smaller or larger football-shape? I also know I could “block” it but I am thinking the distorted shape indicates a problem with my knitting?

My little square back and forth knitted dishcloth turned out fine, so my problem didn’t come until I tried this diagonal thing.

Here is a picture of the finished football dishcloth (which actually looks closer to square in the picture than in real life):

and a close-up of the stitching on the “increase” portion, if it helps

I counted stitches as I went and really did increase only 2 stitches per row, like the pattern said …

Can anyone help me figure out what I’m doing wrong?

Thank you!
Kim

2

I think it’s more the nature of garter stitch to pull in like that. That’s where blocking comes in. If you wet it and stretch it into shape, then you should be able to get a square.

3

actually, did you increase once at the begining of each row?
or once at the begining and once at the end of each row?

it looks ok to me, but I made one that came out VERY oblong, made it a cute little Church hat with Ribbon Bow for the kids to wear to the ren Faire

2 increases per row makes for a <> shape
one per row makes a much more even square, and a more pronounced Opening

Just what I remember from my First try

ecb

4

Thanks for taking the time to answer!
I guess I was thinking something simple like a dish cloth wouldn’t need blocking?

Well, once at the beginning and once at the end, I guess, because the little YO holes are part of the pattern and need to be at both sides.

So it started with 4 stitches and then the next row was
K YO KK YO K and then
K YO K K K K YO K

up to 44 stitches. The pattern didn’t include any decreases until after the 44 stitch mark …

and the little sample one in the pattern is nice and square. LOL!

5

I think that ecb hit the nail on the head. If you are doing the increases at both ends of every row, your piece will become that oblong sort of shape rather than a square.

The eyelets do appear to be on all edges of the cloth but they are only placed at the beginning of every row. Doing it that way will produce a square in the end.

Take another look at the pattern. It says to K2, yo, knit across row. Every row will be the same, with the increase only at the beginnings.

6

OH MY GOODNESS, you’re right!

I just figured that out before I came here!!

I knew the pattern said that, but I couldn’t wrap my head around how the eyelets would be on both sides :?? and so I was doing the YO at both ends because … well, because I was really confused!!!

YAY!

Thank you!!!

7

Just another comment on odd shapes…mine come out elongated when I’m done, but I just toss it in the washer and dryer and it comes out square again. The corners ARE rounded, but who cares, it’s a dishcloth. :teehee: