Sl1, K5, K2tog
Here’s a little stitch sequence I’ve been experimenting with on the sock machine:
Sl1, K5, K2tog, K to end (Slip one, Knit 5, Knit 2 together, Knit to end of row.)
You can see that my yarn is on the right side, so I will knit right to left.
To Slip 1, in this case on the first stitch, simply raise the needle out of work, and knit past it. To the left of the raised needle you can see 5 needles in ordinary position – this is the Knit 5, and then you can see I have lifted the stitch off the 6th needle and placed it onto the 7th needle, making two stitches on the 7th needle. That is K2tog (Knit 2 together.)
But if I leave that empty needle in place, it will pick up a stitch when I knit past it. Or if I raise the needle I’ll get another Slip stitch. So….
I remove the newly emptied needle.
Problem now – when I knit past the empty space I’ll create a mock rib stitch, which in this instance, I don’t want. So….
I move the raised needle, and the 5 that will knit regularly RIGHT OUT of the cylinder, and move them one slot to the left, closing in the space. (You can see there are now 3 empty spaces adjacent to the red hash mark in this photo, while in the previous photo there are only 2 empty slots.)
Note that to do a sequence like this I do all the needle fiddling for the entire row first, then knit the row.
This is probably another one of those things that is more work on a sock machine than on DPN’s. But what the heck.
If I repeat this pattern going back and forth, I can go from this:
To this:
And all that is but a few steps on the way to this:
Can you see the Slip 1, Knit 5, Knit 2 Together happening?
OOhh–the anticipation builds—what is the end result of this shaping???
Damn! That is beautiful!!! The hanging knitting scares the bejeebus out of me, tho.
I’m not sure why hanging-knitting scares people. I do know that it scared me too – just one of those things you need to do a few times to realize there is no pain!
It’s actually more dangerous to transfer a stitch – if it slips off your pic it will run. But if you take a needle out of the machine, the stitch stays on it, even if you drop the needle – so actually its safer!
No specific project in the works for this pattern – just trying to build a repertoire of small patterns that I can incorporate into future projects.
I’ve been trying to learn some ‘equivalents’ between hand knitting and sock machine knitting. It’s a long slog for me because I don’t hand knit so I have difficulty visualizing what a particular stitch sequence should do/look like.
At the same time, there are bizillions of sock patterns for hand knitters and precious few for machine knitters – so I figure if I can learn some basic stitch equivalents then it should open up the world of socks that I can knit on my sock machine. Then I hope to at least adapt some hand knit patterns, if not follow them exactly.
It’s great what you’re doing!
The one thing that struck me is your slip stitch. In order to get a true knitted slip stitch on a CSM, you would need to lift the needle and then wrap the yarn behind the lifted needle. The way that it looks like you are doing it, makes for a wrap (2 stitches) on the lifted needle. This may add unnecessary bulk. I hope this helps you decipher the hand knitted slip stitch.
Pat
Thanks. I think I understand what you’re saying. The way I do it, when I come back on the slipped stitch on the subsequent pass I’ll get a stitch made up of one loop but two bars. If I slip the yarn behind the raised needle the stitch would have a single loop but also a single bar.
Yep! You got it! In this particular application, the slip stitch gives you a nice edge. I’ve not done it on a CSM (never even thought about it till now) but it may make the edge curl. Let us know what happens.
I was tempted to try the slip stitch along the edge of the insole.
A pattern I was looking at (for DPN.s) in Interweave’s ‘Favorite Socks’ – “Two Yarn Resoleable Socks” by Wayne Pfeffer, adapted by Anne Merrow – does the insole separately – in this case the outer edge stitches of the insole are knit plain for 8 rows, and thereafter with a slip stitch. I presume that has something to do with the first stitches tying in with the gusset formation differently than tying the insole and sole together.