Changing Colors at the End of the Row

I’ve been promising to write a post about changing yarn colors at the end of a row. I’m not sure I do it correctly but it seems to work.

Either you’re going to have to have a very good imagination or be a very good knitter to get this I’m afraid. I couldn’t take a video. Nothing and no one here to hold the camera so I took a few pictures.

First, I knit to the end of the row with Color #1, which in this case is the blue. Then I break the blue thread, leaving at least a 10″ tail. If you’re running short on yarn, you can make it shorter but I hate messing with small pieces. My next color, #2, is red. Slip about 10″ of the red thread under Color #1 (blue), knit one stitch with Color #2, then when you knit the second stitch with Color #2, catch the #2 tail in the back of that stitch. That doesn’t really secure it but keeps that first stitch from being quite so floppy.

Second, drop the #2 tail (red) and pick up the #1 tail (blue). Since you’re still working across the blue stitches, catch that blue tail in the back of every other stitch across the next 10 stitches. Catch it in the back, next stitch – don’t catch it; next stitch – catch it; next stitch – don’t catch it and so on til you’ve caught it about 5 times. This doesn’t really secure the tail but it moves it away from the edge a bit.

When you come back to that point again (the beginning of the row – in theory, you will knit across the row the first time with the new color, knit or purl across from the wrong side, then start again on the right side at the same edge where you picked up the new color. This time, start picking up the new color. The way I do it this way is I’m picking up the blue yarn in the final row of blue stitches (even though I’m using red yarn, I’m knitting into the blue stitches), then on the second pass, I’m picking up red yarn into red stitches.

I hold the tail like I would when I’m doing colorwork – working yarn in right hand and tail in left hand.

Then, when it’s time do the final weaving of the ends, this is the way the back side looks.

I’ve moved the tails away from the edge a bit. Now, I will do a duplicate stitch, using the blue tail in the blue yarn and the red tail in the red yarn. I will make 6 or 8 stitches, then cut the excess yarn away.

This is what the back side looks like. None of this shows from the front and when the piece gets flipped over, as shawls certainly will, it doesn’t awful.

If you’ve never done a duplicate stitch, you can google it and get a much better explanation but I used the red yarn on the blue yarn so you can see it better. Simply follow the flow of the stitch on the back side of the piece using a tapestry needle.

Always try to use the same color yarn on the same color yarn. It’s really hard to make it not show from the right side if you’re using vastly different colors.

You may need to do some creative traveling with the yarn to get the tail to the same color knitting but that’s another reason to leave a longer tail.

I hope this helps.