MondayLunchCrew

I’ve been doing well enough with my knitting on MS3 so far, here are some tips that’s helping me keep my place:

1. I count on the WS row to make sure I haven’t dropped any stitches. If I have, I only have to tink back one row to fix them.
2. I taped the charts so that left and right side are together, this way, I don’t get lost between sheets.
3. I count out and write out the count for each section of a plain knit stitch. That way, when I am reading the chart, I can read it as (right slant, yarn over, knit for 5 stitches, yarn over, left slant etc….)
4. I’m using a big piece of pieced together post-it notes to keep track of my place. I place it horizontally across the pattern so that I’m always reading the right line and never more. This way, if I drop the chart etc, I won’t lose my place.
5. I marked on the pattern each row I’ve finished correctly. (In pencil, in case I had to rip and redo sections.)
6. Since the right slant and left slant symbols started to look the same after a while, I went over each symbol with a coloured ink that’s helping make the chart much easier to read.
7. I’ve put in lifelines once every 10 rows or so. I mark the row on the chart, just in case I have to use the lifeline. I’m using perle cotton thread (from cross stitching) so that they slide out easily and doesn’t add any bulk. They are white, not to add colour just in case everything isn’t colourfast and gets wet. To keep them from falling out, or getting tangled, I make the lines long enough to tie the ends together in a simple square knot in the back of the piece. I also put in a lifeline for each clue given. I’m trying to keep track of how each section looks. Once I’m certain I have a lifeline in a good place, I remove all the old ones (except at Clue sections) to keep things from getting all tangled.
8. As I knit across the row, I will mark my place with an eraser or something, every few small sections to help keep me on the right track of where I am.
9. I read my knitting to make sure that yo’s line up as they are supposed to. Either they are stacked or offsets of one or etc. To make sure that I catch a mistake as soon as possible. So far, I haven’t had to use a lifeline yet due to this reason. I look at the chart and my knitting after every WS row. This way, I’m comparing how it looks in the chart with how my knitting is doing. It’s part of learning to read my knitting properly. I look at what’s coming up on my chart for the next row, so I’m more prepared to notice a problem when I’m knitting and something feels out of place.
10. I’m using two markers as suggested by the pattern designer. I haven’t found a good place to add any more markers yet.
11. As of Clue 2, so far, the pattern is almost always that a yarn over is followed by a left slant or a right slant is followed by a yarn over Noticing this has helped me keep track of when I’ve done something wrong or is about to do something wrong.
12. If you’ve dropped a stitch somewhere and you can’t find it, and it hasn’t unravelled anything all the way down, you’ve likely dropped a yarn over. I’d look for any missing yarnovers first.
13. I am indeed using a cobweb weight (LB Cashwool, 1ply) and I’ve been keeping the yarn cake in a ziploc as I work on the project so it doesn’t risk rolling around, getting kicked or played with by the dog etc. I can’t afford any tangles.

So, that’s what I’m doing so far, your mileage may vary, but hopefully something here was useful.