Hi this is my first thread, so I hope I’m doing it right. I watched a very cool video from this site teaching the Russian Join technique of switching to different colored yarn. Was so excited to try it because the way I learned leaves lots of tails of yarn to darn in later. But When I try to knit with the Russian Join it looks messy and bits of yarn poke through the stitch. I tried joining after triming half the plies and without triming. I would love to use this method if someone could give me tips on how to make it work. Thanks for any help.:knitting:
I now use the Russian join exclusively. When you weave the yarns through each other to make the join, be sure you pull on both loose ends to tighten the loops. Then ruin your fingers down each one away from the loops so that they look and feel like one strand of yarn. Try to arrange it so that the ends wind up on the wrong side of the work. No need to clip them or weave them in; the Russian join is very strong and the ends won’t unravel. BTW, a visitor from Alaska told me that that is what the fishermen use to splice their ropes. Hope this helps.
Here is a nice tut with close up pictures from KnitPicks. http://community.knitpicks.com/notes/Joining_Yarn_-_Russian_Join
I prefer to use this join mainly with synthetic fibers, but if I am using an animal fiber yarn in project that does not require color switching when joining new yarn I like to use the felted join. Sometimes the “Russian Join” can be a bit bulky. Make sure when you form the loops they aren’t to big, otherwise it will be noticeable in the fabric you are knitting.
Katrina
Thank you both for the help, I will definitly work on it. It looks so easy in the video, Im excited to use the method once I make it work.