Lace and Remembering About Yarn Overs

I've been knitting a little bit of lace lately, and the yarn overs can get a bit confusing, especially late at night when you convince yourself you can make it through one last row of 200-plus stitches before you nod off.  The yarn overs are easy enough when you are knitting all of your stitches, but where I need a bit of a reminder is when I have a yarn over in between a knit and a purl stitch.

There was a lot of that in Little Shells, which I've just finished knitting, but as you can see, haven't blocked yet.

Little shells done

I made it all the way through the pattern with only one small instance of having to unknit a few stitches to get back to a mistake by using one simple device.  I made up a rhyme to help me remember the yarn overs. It goes like this:

        Knit to Purl, you swirl.

        Purl to Knit, that's it.

What I mean by that is easy to decipher.  When you have a yarn over in between a knit stitch and a purl stitch, you have to bring the yarn from the back to the front and then wrap it around the needle completely again, i.e., you "swirl" it.  Going from a purl to a knit, your yarn is already in front of the needle and you need do nothing between the stitches, your yarn over is automatic.  In other words, "that's it."

As silly as it seems, this little device made my knitting so much easier, that I wanted to share it.  I'm looking forward to showing you this shawlette in all of its glory once its blocked!

Little shells done 2

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