Maintaining Tension While Learning Continental

Hi there!

I’ve been knitting with by throwing for most of my life, but I’m wanting to knit sweaters more efficiently so they don’t take me a year, and eventually I want to move on to color work, so I’ve been teaching myself Continental style. I can see that the stitches themselves are time saving, but I feel like I can’t manage my tension at all. I have watched 12 different YT videos and tried all manner of weaving the yarn thru my left hand, however, I still feel like the yarn isn’t gliding seamlessly through my fingers. This causes me to unwrap and rewrap multiple times in a row, thus WASTING time instead of saving it. When I use a looser wrap, it all falls apart. Does anyone have advice as to hand positioning that will help the yarn glide more freely? I feel I am so close, and the tension no question looks more even!

I thread the yarn through my fingers. Between my ring and middle fingers I can control tension so that I have enough to pull the yarn for the new stitch through the stitch on the needle then relax it to let the stitch have its full share of yarn and let the yarn flow easily for the next stitch. LRR until it becomes reflexive. I can’t do a lot of finger movements so using my index finger on the yarn as many in knitting videos do is not possible. Keeping the yarn between my index finger and the needle short makes a big difference too. I think this is referred to as closed and greater distance between finger and needle is open. Those are things I can definitely say I worked on while learning to control tension and knit more evenly. I still have a lot of room for improvement. If you’re not familiar with Arne and Carlos on You Tube you might look at some of their videos just to watch Arne in particular knit. I can’t tension the yarn the way he does but they did persuade me of the benefits of Norwegian purling. You might consider learning to purl that way also. The reason I say that is you avoid moving the yarn forward and backward and that in and of itself can help maintain tension, at least it does for me. I keep trying to learn throwing and keep failing. I can’t teach my dominant right hand to tension the yarn. It comes down to what works for you and that’s not much help when nothing seems to be working.

In my photos the yarn is short but in reality I keep it shorter. I couldn’t get the picture of how I really do it.

Making a knit
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Making a purl
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I presume you don’t crochet. You might learn. Crocheters hold the yarn in the left hand and using a hook is different enough that you’re learning a new skill and starting from scratch which might make it easier. I hold my yarn much the same for Continental knitting as I do for crochet. Fun fact: the world’s fastest knitters are typically throwers and often use a knitting belt and long dpn or long straights with one anchored under the arm or on a hip. I would love to use long needles and anchor the right one somehow but I have yet to learn to hold the yarn for throwing. I’m not giving up; I’ve only been trying for about 50 years off and on.

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Have you ever watched Eunny knit? If not prepare to be amazed. Skip up to about 3 min. and you can see her knitting lace. She holds the yarn in a different way. Bonus: she shows an easier way p5tog.

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Sorry can’t really be of much help in advising how to wrap or tension the yarn, only to suggest that if you’ve been learning on circular needles then perhaps try straights for a while. There are a couple of thjngs I find with circulars, one is the cable (even a free moving one that turns in its joint) tugs on the direction of the needles shaft and alters my knitting position. Whilst that’s fine a lot of the time and I can compensate for the pull, I also know it effects my yarn tensioning and how I manipulate the needles and the yarn. Sometimes there are just too many variables to deal with at once. The other thing is the long shaft of a straight needle can be used to anchor (hands, yarn, fabric, stitches) in more ways than the short shaft of the circular needle. Another thing you ight try is a different needle material, maybe bamboo for a bit more grip as this may help you control the yarn flow and tension rather than a super slippery needle. I have to change how I knit and tension between using my budget bamboo which have good grip and my more expensive wood which are extremely slippery. Having a bit if grip on the needle means your hands can focus more on manipulating the movement of the needles and the tension on the yarn rather than trying to keep stitches in place on the needle.
I am also a thrower (hmm… I’ve been through this before and I’m not a thrower, there is another term for what I do and I have totally forgotten it) and also learned continental for the reason of wanting to try colour work with a yarn in each hand. I’m not sure that continental mastery is required before jumping into 2 colours because by adding a second colour, floats and yarn in both hands (or 2 yarn colours in the left hand), adds another set of variables which effects tension - if you want good tension in colour then maybe better to practice in colour.
I worked a long swatch with 2, 3, 4 colours per row trying different ways of holding the multiple yarns (threading 2 yarns in one hand will change what you do again) u till working just one yarn in each hand felt comparatively “easy”.
I’ll never be able to manipulate and tension the yarn with my left hand the way I do my right hand but by using both there is enough control to produce a reasonable stranded colour work fabric . I would never, for example, knit lace continental style I just don’t have the dexterity and control to choose that way, lace and cables will always be for my throwing (not throwing) right hand.

As with any new skill it will likely slow you down before it speeds you up.
Throwing has a reputation for being slow but the fastest knitters hold the yarn in the right hand. Trying these different things can be fun.

I too had the same problem when I switched to left-hand yarn carrying. (To Eastern uncrossed in my case). One great thing about English style is greater “stitch size regulation” and “stitch security” IMO. It can also be quite fast. The fastest knitter in the world (not the Guiness record holder, a Dutch lady, but the English lady who has won almost every other competition, one of which included the Guiness winner. Her name is Hazel something. She was not in the competition the 9ther lady won.). - she knits eng style, carrying the yarn in her right hand, holding the needles close to the tips & flicking the yarn with her index finger more than actually wrapping it.

Your tension will come with time and practice, but IMO it will never be quite as automatic as Eng. Style is. I still have to think about it quite a bit, mainly on purl stitches, but after nearly 50 years of Eastern knitting, It would be too hard to go back.

Just keep practicing!

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