Knitting Past and Ribbed Breakthrough

Choosing to focus on knitting during my ACL rehab is not completely random.  I have been knitting since I was about nine or so.

Mom taught me the basic knit stitch and I remember the first item I knitted.  It was a complete mess with uneven stitches, randomly slimming one row and widening another row - worse than a yo-yo dieter.  Regardless, I remember being proud of the piece.

Stockinette stitch.

Eventually, I learned the purl stitch and was able to knit the stockinette stitch, which is knitting one row, purling the next, and repeat.

For years, I wanted to learn more stitches, knit things besides scarfs and make sense of the secret knitting pattern codes.

I bought books, thought about taking knitting classes (it's the thought that counts, right?), joined knitting groups (ok, it was one MeetUp group that I went to once), and asked friends for knitting tips.

I was just never able to get over the hump of anything more complex than the stockinette stitch.

Then this summer, pre-Jackass-running-into-me-and-tearing-my-ACL, I finally got over the hump and learned a new stitch - the ribbed stitch.

The Ribbed Stitch
For the most part, every knitted items is composed of the knit and purl stitches. 

My first ribbed stitch!  Still a scarf, but it's a different pattern.

There are fancier versions of the stitches but this is a craft where you create stitches just by looping the yarn over the needle - so simple!

I think the simplicity that can produce such a variety of patterns makes knitting so endearing.

The ribbed stitch is created by alternating knit and purl stitches within one row, and then following that pattern for the remaining rows.

So knit three stitches, purl three stitches, knit three stitches, purl three stitches, and so on.

Or, you can have thinner ribbing and knit and purl in sets of two, which is what I did for my first ribbed stitch item: a black scarf that I started in December and just finished in June.  Right in time for the 80-degree summer weather!

Challenge 1 
Despite how easy it sounds, I struggled with this stitch until I watched a YouTube video of someone doing a ribbed stitch, and realized that yarn placement is key for the ribbed stitch.

After watching the YouTube video at least three times, I realized that when I was transitioning between stitches, I needed to move the yarn to accommodate the stitch type.

For purl stitches, the yarn needs to start on the front of the piece of the knitted item on the right needle (assuming you are right-handed).  For the knit stitch, the yarn needs to be moved to the back of the piece before starting to knit the next stitch.

The incorrect yarn placement results in a hot mess of unrecognizable stitches that are really 1.5 stitches since you are looping the yarn over the needle one and a half times.

I had to restart my project a few times before my YouTube epiphany.

Challenge 2 
Another challenge I had was with the ends of the piece.  For some reason, I would accidentally drop a stitch and the after working the next row and realizing that I was short a stitch, would have to "make up" a stitch, and just loop the yarn around my right needle.

Upon closer look, the ends are sloppy, but barely noticeable when wearing the scarf.

I could never figure out what I was doing wrong to have such loose and lost stitches at the ends, but think it has to do with yarn placement.