Techniques
Eastern European Knitting Note
August 2, 2009 | 
Author POST UPDATED May 9, 2010
One snag I found with knitting this style is that MY knitting in the round resulted in twisted stitches. I checked with Gail at Gail Knits and she pointed out that you have to watch the loop you are working on. I learned that if you always work with the side of the loop nearest the tip you won’t get a twisted knit or pearl. With EEK you need to watch this, but regardless of your knitting style you always have to understand which way to wrap the yarn and what will twist and not twist the loops. When I asked Gail she said you can’t knit in the round with EEK. But now I wonder what style of Eastern European knitting she is using. Apparently there are different ones.
I also learned from Gail that k2tog and ssk are kind of reversed with EEK. Ssk is just k2tog through the back of the loop, and k2tog is slip and turn 2, slip back to the left and then k2tog through the front loops. So remember that if you are switching to or learning EEK that some stitches will be done differently.
Since I use both, i find swapping between EEK and PK is like speaking two different languages. You have to change how you think. Practice!
UPDATE: I had written in a previous version of this post that couldn’t knit in the round with EEK, but Cyndi commented a few days ago that I was misinformed. So I watched more videos on Eastern European knitting and tried it again and found I was NOT getting twisted stitches in the round. I don’t know what I was doing before, but it was wrong, and maybe Gail is doing a different method of Eastern European knitting.
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Eastern European Knitting, a.k.a Combined Knitting?
Last Sunday I went to my nearest local yarn/knitting shop, Gails Knits, to take advantage of their summer sale and bought yarn for my first project, the cabled scarf with seed stitch border you see in the page header (That’s a pic from the book – I haven’t started the scarf yet, but I did pick red. ) and as I was checking out I told Gail about the Portuguese Knitting DVD and how much I liked the style. I showed her the basics, and she in turn showed me her style, which is eastern european knitting (EEK). Apparently, it’s pretty rare. She said there was an article some years ago in a knitting magazine that listed the top ten styles of knitting, and it was number 9.
It turns out it is a bit faster than Portuguese knitting, seemingly having one less step in that you don’t have to flick the yarn over the needle. That’s not a big chore, but when I was watching Gail demonstrate it she was amazingly fast. I’ll have links to videos and pages here soon. It’s a variant of continental knitting, a pick style, and is quite worthwhile.
I’m still practicing but I did find that it wasn’t so great for a bulky yarn. I am doing a cossack hat from the Folk Hats book by Vicki Square and even with my nice and pointy new Options Nickel Plated circulars didn’t work so well on the thick, bulky Wool-ease yarn by Lion Brand when using EEK. I couldn’t catch the yarn and pull it through. So I tried the Portuguese knitting and it was much easier.
That’s interesting and handy to know. Now we have more tools with which to knit. I’ve learned one should choose carefully from knitting style, yarn material, yarn thickness, needle material and pattern. When I started out I would never have thought it mattered.
Here’s what the hat will look like when done:
The cossack hat in the book.
The hat is from Folk Hats by Vicki Square, pages 88-90. This one uses a bouclet yarn which seems to emulate shearling. I may do one with black later. For now I’m just re-using the yarn from the crochet scarf I killed playing with my new ball winder.
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Posted in Projects, Techniques | 
Tags: ball winder, combined knitting, cossack, crochet, eastern european knitting, Gail Knits, hat, knit, reincarknitting, scarf | 
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Portuguese Knitting DVD Arrives
Just got the Andrea Wong Portuguese Knitting DVD and it is great. Plays fine in my computer – someone said it wouldn’t play on any of her DVD players. I tried it on my Sanyo DVD player for my TV and it works fine.
This is great! As I was first attempting – literally – to get a grip in knitting I kept thinking I needed to be an octopus to knit. Controlling the yarn tension and moving the yarn around the needle in the continental or English style of knitting is insanity-making for me, and probably for many newcomers. But I bet that even seasoned knitters would love this just for watching a few seconds of the lessons in Portuguese knitting.
The stitches are fluid and simple, and the knitting pin controls both the trajectory and tension of the yarn just so beautifully. From knit to pearl you don’t have to move the yarn from back to front, but with a flick of your thumb you move it to be over or under the right needle depending on what stitch you are doing. In effect, this puts it behind or in front, but as the yarn is always coming from your pin or pendant its still easier than moving front to back or back to front as in other styles.
I’ve only watched a minute or two and felt the tension leaving my body. I feel so much better about learning to knitting. I admit, I’ve barely learned the knit and pearl stitches English style and have hated every minute of it. Now I’m free! You’ve got to learn this method!
Sunday I joined Netflix to get the knitting dvd they had and it arrived yesterday, but I may not even bother with it. It is called Knit Stitches in Motion. I guess I should see if there’s anything on it that is generally useful, or maybe patterns. I’ll let you know. (UPDATE: not worth your time, even for learning other styles.)
Again, I haven’t watched much yet, but I’ve heard that they also use hooked knitting needles sometimes as well. That would be handy as well, but it looks like if done right you wouldn’t need them. I may modify a pair of my bamboo units to see how that works. I fiddled with knitting with a couple of crochet hooks and it was a lot easier to control the yarn, but that was with English style. I didn’t need to fret about losing the yarn off the tips of the needles when pulling it through the stitch. In Portuguese knitting the angle of the needles and the yarn almost guarantee you won’t lose it. Yea!
I’m thinking of starting a movement to have continental and English styles banned and all the books burned. Memory and mention of them should be removed from all books and web sites, like how Rameses removed the name of Moses from all monuments in Egypt! Just kidding of course. But that’s how much I like the Portuguese style of knitting. It was so much easier to learn. Give it a try.
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