Knitting Blog

The Chinese Waitress Cast-On is a beautiful, reversible, and stretchy short-tail cast-on. It is one of the most popular new cast-ons in the knitting world today because of its novelty, stretchiness, and reversibility.

The Garter Tab Cast-On is an ingenious way to invisibly start a triangular shawl. Since most triangular shawls have a small garter-stitch border, you can use this cast-on to invisibly set up your stitches for knitting the triangle from the center-out.

All the cast-ons in the world can be divided into two categories: short-tail and long-tail. You can ONLY use a long-tail cast-on to START a knitting project. If you want to cast on in the middle of a project, you’ll need to use a short-tail cast-on.

If your cast-on is too tight, you are probably pulling the wrong yarn as you make each cast-on stitch. When you are doing a Long-Tail Cast-On, tug with your thumb, not your index finger, to tighten the stitches.

Emily Ocker’s Circular Cast-On is an easy and invisible way to cast on in the center of a circular project. It creates a drawstring-like circle that you can pull tight so that there’s no hole in the center of your project.