Uneven Knitting Tension

by Joanne

I cannot seem too get my knitting straight.

My purls are too big. I have tried purling on smaller needles but that makes it worse. I have been to knitting stores and no one seems to be able to help me. Am I pulling to tight on the purls, making them looser? It seems the harder I try to make it straight the worse it looks. Its as if the knit stitches get smaller and the purls even bigger.

Am I too tense or something? I have gotten some items straight. Am I not holding the yarn correctly? I wrap it around my pinkie and then around my index finger.

I am at a loss about this. I have had some success with knitting on a smaller needle and purling on the larger because some one told me maybe I was not knitting tight enough?

Any suggestions?

Thank you so much.

YOUR ANSWER

The first bit of advice I have for you is to relax a bit. No-one can knit perfectly when they are just beginning and it takes time and practice to get your tension even.

If it was me I wouldn't be trying to knit with two different sized needles, it might help to solve the problem in the short term but in the end it will cause you to knit with different tensions on knit and purl rows forever. That would make it very difficult for you to knit anything other than plain knitting or stocking stitch!

You would be better off just practicing your knitting until your tension is similar on both knit and purl rows.

You don't mention which knitting method you use but for the purpose of answering your question, I am assuming that you do not use the continental method. Maybe the problem is that for knit rows you hold the yarn at the back of the work and for purls you are holding it at the front.

You could be holding the yarn slightly differently depending on which type of row you are doing. Do you flick the yarn over the needle with your index finger as you are knitting the stitch?

Try a couple of rows where you let the yarn hang free from the knitting and rather than flicking actually wrap the yarn around the needle.

The other thing you could try is to forget about changing the tension on the purl rows and concentrate on loosening your stitches on the knit rows. It is possible that when you are doing purl stitches you are forming the stitch further down the needle than when you are forming the knit stitches. A stitch that is formed on the tip (or close to it) will be tighter than one formed on the main shaft of the knitting needle, so on your knit rows make sure that you move the new stitch all the way onto the needle before you start to knit the next stitch.

As you are doing your knit stitches try to make sure that each stitch slides easily along your needle. If it gets stuck or is difficult to move, your tension is too tight.