Fixing Cables

Merrily knitting on the train.

I’ve been test knitting a couple of sweaters for Ysolda’s upcoming Rhinebeck Sweater book.

I was merrily knitting along on my Beekman Tavern while on holiday when I clearly stopped paying attention to the chart and knit from memory. When I looked down to admire my sweater one evening in London I realized about 20 rows back my cable was a complete circle instead of a criss crossing cable. Woops!

This is what the cable should’ve looked like!

I thought about ripping back all 20 rows, then remembered that was about 5 hrs of knitting I didn’t want to redo. So I opted for just ripping out the cable. This second option was surprisingly easier than I thought it would be, taking maybe an hour tops.

To start with, I got my knitting needles situated so they were near the errant cable, then I pulled out all the stitches until just below the error.

Halfway ripped back. See the complete circle?

The next step is crucial, I went to bed. 🙂 Then because we were sight seeing the next day my sweater stayed in the hotel until I had time to sit and fix it properly. That time ended up being on the train ride north the following day. I stuck my cable needle into the stitches I was working with and used my working needle to knit from the cable needle.

Knitting from the cable needle

I used my non-working needle to hold my extra strands out of the way while I was knitting. It was as though I was knitting a skinny 20 stitch cable that just happened to be stuck to my big old sweater. I made sure to reference the chart for all the cable crosses this go round and before I knew it I was back to the top, ready to go with the sweater.

Totally fixed and ready to continue knitting!

Ta DA! So if you screw up your cables really far back and can’t be bothered to rip back all your knitting, go ahead, rip out just the cable stitches. It’ll work out! 🙂 And if you’re local to me I’ll happily sit beside you and help.

The trials of this sweater on holiday continue. Haha. I’ll tell you more about it soon. 🙂 Suffice it to say, when traveling far away for holiday be sure you pack everything you could possibly need!