how I knit fast using the English method

hey everyone this is Annie from me something about yarn podcast I am gonna try to film a tutorial today never done it before so we'll see how it goes but yeah so I saw a video recently on basically speed knitting knitting faster and I was talking about how Continental is so much better and all these things and I wanted to I'm not going to name the video because I know that there are actually multiple I've seen so it's been a long coming thing for me I just wanted to film a tutorial or sort of thing for how I knit I've never seen anybody knit quite like I do I've had a lot of knitters comment on how I knit and I thought that it would be helpful for somebody out there who would like to knit faster I knit English so I do use my right hand for the yarn and like I said I just I've had a lot of people comment wow you're so fast how do you knit so fast with English and I showed them and they're like oh wow that's awesome first thing though I would like to say is don't try to speed knit just to just for the sake of getting more done I would say that's my recommendation for you I would say you know if you're knitting speed frustrates you to the point that you set things down definitely try to knit faster to kind of help with that process but I would recommend don't try to speed knit and take away from the experience with everything going on right now in the world one of the things that slowing down has really helped me realize is there are some times when I do things as quickly as I possibly can just to get them done and say that I did and I miss out on the experience so that's my two cents worth right there just to you know throw that out there this is a you know kind of a video to show how I knit to help you if you're knitting speed is frustrating you and you would just like to knit faster so that being said let's get started I started a little swatch here with some of my super wash worsted yarn right here so I just did about four rows of ribbing and then I started in on stockinette stitch to be able to not have it roll I'm gonna try this is very disorienting there we go so that it doesn't roll on me and then I did knit stitches that either end so doesn't curl in there so I cast on I believe is 21 stitches and this is like I said worst in wait everybody this is 4.0 no four point five millimeter needles yeah us i seven four point five millimeter just to make this such as a little bit bigger for you guys to see so when I knit I like I said I hold the yarn in my right hand to tension the yarn I go like this that's all I do is I just kind of go like that and I hold it now the most important part of how I knit faster and this is um somebody help me kind of narrow it down on why I can knit so fast and one of the reasons is when I do the yarn over my pointer finger I don't wrap it or any of that I don't wrap it back here I actually wrap it right over let me see if I can get it to focus I actually wrap it over my fingernail right over basically the arch of my cuticle right there so when I go to pick up the yarn like this and there I am so I'm just gonna knit a couple of stitches and you can see what I do so I hope this is going to show up but basically the idea in in every video that I've seen were they they depict English horses Continental they show English as always being this process where you're holding the yarn you have to drop the needle wrap and then go around like that and it honestly it made me a little bit irritated that they always purchase English knitting to be like that when it's really not obviously and I think part of it is that the reason they do that is to kind of accentuate the slowness of English knitting to make their point and make you know continental seem better which I they are equal in pros and cons honestly and you need to do what is best for you what makes you comfortable and I am ambidextrous which means that I can use my left and my right hand for many things knitting is one of them so when I'm doing a lot of color work yes I will use continental with like one color and then I'll have the other color English and I can say wrapping the yarn with English is actually a lot easier I don't have to do that thing where I have to come down to do pearls like continental people do so just a quick plug for English but at the end of the day you need to do what is the best fit for you so this is not a you know English is by far superior and Continental stinks or anything kind of video it's strictly if you if you do knit English and would like to knit faster this is what I do and this is why I knit so fast so I another trick is I keep I work really close to the ends of the needles so I use this finger to kind of guide the stitch and kind of let me see if I can bring it closer loops then bring this a little closer for you so I hope that let me see let me zoom in a little bit so this is very hard to do looking at a camera so and this is a lot this is quite a bit slower than I can go with smaller needles the bigger the needle the more motion is involved so the slower I go so and like I said it's very hard to do this and watch the camera to make sure I'm in focus I can't knit without looking but for some reason being on film you know I want to make my emotions as concise as possible and it's clear and easy to see as possible so so that's how I knit I'm gonna flip this over so how I purl first I'm going to knit the stitch the first one like I said to keep it from curling in on itself so now I'm gonna purl across and I flip the yarn around to the front and pull some more yarn so same thing atención a yarn the yarn is over my index finger usually it's about like that sometimes it's a little bit forward hopefully that's in focus and basically here's the thing when I knit I go like this right when you purl you go in the front I am making the exact same motion whether I am knitting or I'm purling which is one of the reasons that I can switch back and forth between knit and purl very easily and very quickly so I'm gonna go ahead and purl without splitting my yarn so that is how I purl I'm and this is really hard to do so close to the table but so I keep my stitches here I usually keep everything very up close on the top of the needles at the ends of the needles so that I can minimize my emotions be efficient and therefore be quick and it's I will say it's mainly when I am purling a long stretch like on the wrong side road that I have the most people comment on how fast I am then I'll knit the end stitch I'm gonna flip it back over now real quick I'm gonna show you how I transition between knitting and purling like I do for ribbing so that's my knit stitch I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna let's see which one did I do down below yeah I did a purl I'm gonna switch and purl now one of the things that I do and I'm doing ribbing especially a knit one purl one like this I am using so I go in wrap and then when I come out while I am pulling off the needle I'm wrapping for the other side so I use that momentum that motion to while the yarn is like the stitches up at the end of the needle before I pull it down because he I use my thumb to pull it down and I use that to basically I mean it makes it faster because I'm not going knit purl I'm going like this where I'm using all of my motion and I hope while I was talking I stuck to you knit one purl one so flop it over flop it over that was really dumb bit okay anyway I'm gonna change the book is a little bit there we go I think that's in focus that way I can be a little bit farther up off the table and then in that last stitch to keep it from curling and there it is I just did two rows of ribbing just like that and that's a knit one purl one so and the same thing applies if I want to do a knit two let's see whenever I go to switch I use the motion of pulling off that stitch when the needle is down and it's easier in reach to go ahead and wrap it around so whoa anyway yeah so there's my am I staying in pattern yeah okay hang on I got lost track of where what's okay pearl pearl and I like I said I wanted to use bigger needles knit the last stitch I wanted to use bigger needles so that you guys could see a little bit better but like I said it is typically quite a bit faster for me to knit with smaller smaller stitches so I am going to switch over to a project that I'm working on you will have seen it on the podcast and I'm just going to knit across and my regular speed so you guys can see so with smaller needles it's even easier to stay at the end of the needle for everything let me zoom in a little bit so you guys can see all right so keep it over my fingernail this finger does a lot to guide the stitches put some more yarn out so yeah so hard to do I know I keep saying that but it's nerve-racking doing it on camera for some reason so yeah now if I were to if I were in pattern to start purling would be the same thing and there you go just like that I did one two three four five six seven eight nine ten oh my goodness my counting is perfect my subconscious counting is perfect anyway so just like that I did ten purl stitches so basically no matter what I need to do I'm good because the yarn being got it over my fingernail makes it to where I have a lot more of a I don't know I can get the yarn where it needs to go a lot more easily without taking my hand off the needle without any excess movements I mean let me zoom out again so you guys can see my whole hands as you can see when I'm knitting the motions I mean my hands are hardly moving and if you watched the fastest knitters in the world their hands like they hardly move at all hoops just trained us to love them there we go and one of the things that is also important is keeping this tension right here so that my fingers not way out here obviously but then it's also not right here so that way I can't go around the needle so it's a good distance to where I have the full range of motion while still utilizing very specific and measured movements so when I go like this this motion right here that is when I release the tension for the next stitch for the yarn to move through my fingers and like I said it is completely unconscious at this point for me to unconscious it's not conscious for me to do it so I don't know if I can I'll usually I can't I can't I can't do it I thinking about it I mean I yeah anyway so yeah that is that's it so um I hope this was helpful for you and maybe I'll do another video again soon but like I said give it a try and if you have any questions let me know in the comments thank you for watching happy knitting [Music] you [Music]

Channel: hey anniedot

Views: 48,796

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Id: qv4y48uq4mg

Length: 15min 58sec (958 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 30 2020