Two Socks at Once

Two Socks at Once with the Yahoo double knitting group

I don't knit like anyone else I know. I dimly remember being taught to knit both by my mom, and by my great-grandmother. Then I seem to have gone off by myself and re-invented knitting upside-down and backwards, which probably explains the 30-year hiatus between the last knitting I remember doing and my discovery of knitting frames.

These socks are made by casting on 12 at the toe, and then immediately starting a closed, double-knitted tube on straight needles.

For my first row, I purl 1, make 1 (backwards loop), so the row ends with 24 stitches.
On the second row, I purl 1 (the front layer of the tube) and slip 1 (the back layer). In the third row, I increase by doing a purl 1, make 1 (backwards loop), slip 1 at the beginning and end of the row on the front, and then purl 1, slip 1, make 1, slip 1 on the back.


Some double-knitters seem to me to add stitches in funny places, so they have to take their work onto two needles and then put them back onto one needle to get the stitches alternating front and back again. I prefer to add stitches on the front layer so I can just add another in between on the back, with no taking off and putting back.

After the two tubes got long enough, I took them off the straight needle onto dpns, and then picked them up, alternating stitches, onto one set of dpns.










Checking after knitting a couple of rows to be sure the tubes are still separate.



This is not as hard as I expected! I am knitting both socks "purl side out". This means I can see the inside of the front or outside sock, and the outside of the back or inside sock. I am not used to seeing the knit side of my socks until they are done! The knitting (purling) sequence is

Purl front sock with front yarn

Bring back yarn to front

Purl back sock

Put back yarn in back again

The rhythm feels like a P1 K1 rib, or moss stitch. And I have to say, I love these pink knitting needles. I got six of them at a garage sale, and they are the nicest, slickest needles to knit with. None of that nasty chipping at the points like brand-new needles.