World Travels

Come in to the Wonderland that is the Malabrigo Yarn headquarters in Uruguay. In this feature-length article, I share the colorful experience of a tour through the factory with Malabrigo’s co-creator, Antonio.

Seeing is believing! In this exclusive video tour, you get to see inside the incredibly special world of Malabrigo Yarns and their factory in Uruguay.

This bind-off combines three things you love about socks, but couldn’t have all together until now: a picot edge, a hemmed edge, and the ability to do it on toe-up socks. Here’s how to create a picot hemmed edge at the end of your knitting.

Wait – heel flaps are BACK? Yes, and better than ever. This integrated “faux” heel flap for toe-up socks lets you adjust for high insteps and more.

The Italian cast-on makes a stretchy invisible edge that blends perfectly into 1×1 ribbing. You can use it to start any ribbed project, like the cuff of a mitten or the brim of a hat. It’s a beautiful detail that will change and refresh your (otherwise possibly boring) ribbed cuffs.

Ever since I designed my first pair of mittens, I’ve tried to achieve the perfect mitten thumb. The key is picking up extra stitches around the thumb and then decreasing quickly. The included video tutorial shows you how.

If you use the same technique to hide purl wraps as you do to hide knit wraps, it doesn’t look good on the right side of the work. This is the very trick you need in order to pick up wraps on the purl side of your short rows and keep your work neat and tidy.

If you already know how to Fair-Isle knit, this bag will be a really quick knit. It’s knit in bulky yarn and the chart just flies by. If you are curious about learning to knit Fair-Isle, this is also a good beginner pattern for you. Felting is also a fun thing for beginners to learn.

Reversible cables are made with ribbing so that there is no “wrong side” to the project. This means a reversible-cabled scarf will look fabulous on both sides. Combine your ribbing skills with cabling to knit projects like this Palindrome scarf.

Russian Grafting is a clever alternative to Kitchener stitch. It uses a crochet hook to seam up two live edges of knitting without ever having to get out your tapestry needle. It also creates a decorative, criss-crossed finish.

Adding a textured heel flap is an easy way to make the socks more interesting AND to make the heel more durable at the same time. The slip-stitch heel is super-easy, and it is also nice and stretchy – great if you’re not sure how big the sock-recipient’s ankle is.

Here is a basic hat pattern that was designed for learning the wonderful technique of Magic Loop. Written for worsted-weight yarn, you can make this soft beanie slouchy or fitted. A perfect first hat.

The hemmed edge is a way of casting on that makes your project look completely professional and seamless. Especially flattering on men’s hats, this cast-on is simple yet elegant. A row of purl bumps helps the garment “fold” over the edge.

Mock cables are similar to real cables in that the stitches twist around each other. However, with mock cables you just knit into the second or third stitch on the needle, then the second or first, and so on. It’s a “cheat” cable with an interesting look all its own.

Show off your chunky handspun yarn with this super-fast neckwarmer. It’s simple (in order to highlight the yarn) yet interesting to knit, because of the techniques involved.

Bobbles are a fun challenge for the decoratively-minded. Here I show you how to add small or large bobbles to your knitting. Practice your increases and decreases with this intermediate-knitting challenge.

If you buy a hank (sometimes called “skein”) of yarn and they don’t wind it into a ball for you at the store, you’ll need to do it at home. IF you don’t have a swift or ball-winder, here’s how to do it by hand.