Continental Knitting (In-Store) / May 23

Saturday, May 23, 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.

The continental style of knitting is an excellent alternative for anyone experiencing hand/wrist/elbow discomfort or the scourge of arthritis, as there is significantly less motion impacting the right hand. Continental knitting also offers a balance in hand motions and can be a simpler way for left-handed people to knit right-handed (beneficial since all patterns are written for righties, not lefties). As well, continental can enhance your ability to knit two-handed stranded colourwork. With a little bit of practice, you can produce beautiful knitting comfortably. 

In this workshop, you will discover your most comfortable way to tension the yarn and practice both knit and purl stitches. For the adventurous, and if time permits, we will do a row of two-handed knitting to give you a little flavour of this technique. 

New knitters and crocheters who would like to learn to knit, are welcome.

In this workshop you will practice:

• Hand stretches and exercises that are important for all knitters
• Different ways of holding and tensioning the yarn
• Knit stitches
• Purl stitches
• Moving from Knit to Purl on the same row
• Bonus: two-handed knit side (intro only, this is not a colourwork workshop)

What to bring:

• A light coloured DK or worsted weight yarn – easier to see what you are doing with light colours – choose a wool-like fibre (acrylics are fine) that has some stretch
• 4 mm or 4.5 mm needles 
• Any contrast colour if you want to try two-handed