Learning to knit can be really intimidating, but as I found out, it’s not too hard to learn a couple more fiber skills. And with those skills, you find that you can do so much more! I have wanted to knit socks for a long time, but was too scared to take the plunge and learn when I have only crocheted for 10+ years. I finally put on my big girl panties and buckled down on this journey to learn how to knit socks, which you can follow along here on my blog. You can also see my journey in real time on Instagram @crowchetcreations or through the hashtags #crowchetcreations and #greatsockknittingjourney. Definitely tag me if you are also on a journey to make knit socks or another fiber art goal! My first post, where I go over my inspiration, research, and plan to knit socks, can be found here. After gathering all my supplies and practicing some basic stitches, I knit my first project ever, the Pin Me Up Headband by @knitatude. You can read about the process of actually knitting my first project here. Spoiler: it wasn’t as hard as I thought! I highly recommend this free pattern if you are also looking for a simple or first knitting project.
The Project
With the first few skills of knitting under my belt, I knew that my next step was to learn how to work in the round, or in a three dimensional shape. With socks (themselves essentially a tube) as the ultimate goal, I needed to progress from my first project of a flat headband to something with more depth. With the summer fast approaching, I didn’t want to make a hat. With a little bit of research, I found out about yarn cozies. Basically, they are like miniature bags/hats for your yarn skeins to help hold them together. That way, when you have your skein or ball in your project bag, it is less likely to fall apart and unravel. They just keep things a bit tidier! With a cat and a baby at home, my yarn often gets untidy quickly. I thought this would be a great project to make in the round that I could actually use.
I found the Easy Yarn Cozy pattern by Sarah Zimmermann for free on Ravelry and felt like it was perfect. I wanted to stick with free patterns at first to get my feet wet in the world of knitting. This pattern was fairly easy and clear to understand, and it was also pretty quick to work up. Essentially, you work the cozy in a circle after doing Judy’s Magic Cast-On. You complete regular increases until your cozy is as large as you like, and then you just work in knit stitch around until the ribbing. Structurally, it is very similar to working a magic circle in crochet, making a disc to the desired size, then crocheting continuously in the round. With this cozy pattern, I would get a chance to work in the round, increase, stockinette stitch in the round, and even do ribbing- all skills necessary for socks!
This pattern calls for fingering weight yarn, but I did not have any scraps available to use. I decided to just use some DK weight yarn I had around. The only larger circular needles I had were the 5.0 mm needles I used for my Pin Me Up Headband, which happened to work fairly well for DK weight yarn.
The Skills
In all the knitting podcasts I have watched, I realized that Judy’s Magic Cast-On was an important skill to learn. While it is possible to start this pattern by working around that skill, I wanted to learn it. And I was surprised by how difficult I found this cast on to be! There are many video tutorials out there, but I chose to watch Judy Becker herself describe this technique. It was a good thing this skill was at the very beginning of my yarn cozy so I could keep redoing it until I was comfortable with my tension and stitches.
I was also mind blown to find out that a knit “yarn over” is very different than a crochet “yarn over.” It took a lot of work to override my muscle memory to complete a knit yarn over. I also was very uncertain about how those yarn over stitches would end up looking on the yarn cozy. Instead of KFB (knit front back) to increase stitches, the pattern designer chose to use yarn overs, which creates a lacy, open texture on the bottom of the yarn cozy. I was surprised that after I was done knitting the yarn over/increasing sections that my lacework didn’t look too bad!
I got to practice my tension working in the round, especially along the areas where the magic loop cables looped. My extra long cord made it easy to work my stitches in two sections on the same set of needles rather than juggling multiple double pointed needles (DPNs). However, the edges of the two sections (where the excess cables looped and pulled at the fabric) created something called “ladders,” or loose stitches, the whole way down. Since I worked in stockinette stitch in the round for so many rows on this pattern, I could practice my tension around these trouble areas to try and prevent ladders in my fabric and have a more seamless finish.
This pattern included 2 x 2 ribbing, or two knit stitches followed by two purl stitches, repeated around. If you have been following along on my knitting journey, you will know that I found purling very tricky to do while knitting continental style (aka with the working yarn in my left hand, like I do with crochet). This ribbing section allowed me to practice my coordination while purling and I became a lot more confident!
The Difficulties
As I mentioned above, there were quite a few things I tried to do for the first time on this project. None of my struggles were so great that this project had to be scrapped or put into timeout, but I definitely had to redo a few things, especially at the beginning.
I kept doing my magic cast on much too tight, making it practically impossible to work my stitches. I had to keep casting on over and over again until I was able to create some workable stitches. Again, I highly recommend Judy Becker’s video tutorial on this as she is the master of the magic cast on method!
The yarn overs also gave me a bit of a headache. I had a hard time keeping my tension regular and it was difficult to see while I was in the middle of doing those increases if I was stitching everything correctly. The yarn overs left gaping holes in the yarn cozy, which was the intended look, but since I was still pretty unfamiliar with the anatomy of knitting I felt like I was completing these stitches blindly. And I was surprised after moving on to the stockinette rows that my lacework actually turned out halfway decent!
Overall, my knitting struggles on this project revolved around tension issues. And while some of that can be fixed through simple means, a lot of that requires time and practice before it gets better.
The Learning Opportunities
Some of the skills I learned for this yarn cozy required a bit more repetition to practice. And even now, with a couple socks under my belt (you’ll have to follow along on the blog to learn more!), I still have a hard time doing Judy’s Magic Cast-On too tight and I still rely on YouTube to guide me through the actual cast on.
The yarn overs are a really intriguing way to add texture to knitting, especially because they are so simple and yet can create really complex lace. I really want to explore those stitches as a way to expand my knitting in the future! Maybe there is a pair of socks that use yarn overs to create a lace texture on the instep?
By the end of this project, I felt really good about my overall tension of knitting. I was starting to actually feel comfortable knitting without pulling my yarn too tight! My stitches were looking very consistent too. I am surprised by how far my skills have come in just a few projects.
You can see me bind this yarn cozy off in an IG Live that is now up on my YouTube channel! I try to regularly do IG lives, especially when I am working on fun projects. I love chatting with fellow crocheters and knitters alike as I learn with you!
One thing that I learned firsthand was that since the pattern was written for fingering weight yarn, my DK weight yarn cozy was too big. I should have thought about adjusting the pattern for the thicker yarn, but since I followed the pattern exactly my yarn cozy is quite large. It can hold an entire cake of yarn, but after using the yarn a little bit it will probably lose its usefulness. I definitely want to try adjusting this pattern to be more appropriate for DK weight yarn, or to try this pattern with fingering weight yarn as it calls for. But right now this yarn cozy looks pretty but won’t serve me too much.
This is it- two projects down, one to go. Now that I know how to knit in the round, I will be attempting my *first ever* pair of knit socks! This process was a lot more eye-opening than I anticipated, but I am glad I am now comfortable with the knitting skills I have already acquired and I am excited to see how knitting socks goes! I have a lot of different methods to try as well, so even after my first pair there will be many other updates here on the blog about my #greatsockknittingjourney. I would love to hear about your learning experience if you are also learning how to knit socks for the first time! Please share with me in the comments below or on Instagram @crowchetcreations so we can cheer each other on!
XO, Emily
