Knitted-On Cast-On

I meant to take pics of my blocked swatches and post them, but the daylight got away from me. So I'm going to talk about the "Knitted-On Cast-On" instead. This is a new-to-me technique I've just learned.

I was taught to cast-on using the Long-Tail (or Slingshot) method, which involves the most complicated hand gymnastics of any of the cast-ons. Not that that's a problem, and it's how I teach everyone. However. I tend to cast-on too tightly when I use this, and I recently (about two years ago) started casting-on over two needles held together. Then, I slip one needle out, and start knitting as normal. The loops are larger at first, but after a few rows, the cast-on row relaxes, and the extra space gives the piece just enough elasticity so that it doesn't bind up when I stretch the starting edge of whatever I've been working on. Pretty good solution. I didn't come up with it.

Then, for the Masters, I began doing a little research. And found the knitted-on cast-on. O.M.G. Ok, so you make a slip knot. Put this on the left needle. Insert your right needle into the slipknot knitwise, and knit a stitch, without dropping the slipknot off. Place the new stitch onto the left needle. Repeat with this new stitch, until you have the required number of stitches. I know, I said all this two posts ago. But I'm REALLY excited about it. Why?

OK: first, and most importantly, you don't have to figure out how much yarn to leave as your tail. There is nothing more irritating than casting-on with Long-Tail and discovering (197 stitches later) that there isn't enough tail left for you to finish casting on your 225 sts plus enough to weave in later. So you have to pull the needles out and start all over again with a longer tail. BOO. BOOOOO!

Second, it stretches! Just like stockinette, which it basically is! No binding up your first row! No compensating for the pattern that follows after! It just works! I am overjoyed with it. I've used it now on 4 swatches, all with different stitch patterns, and it's been fine for all of them. There may be some problems, but I'm too giddy to care right now. So it rolls in stockinette. So what? Everything freaking rolls in stockinette!! That right there is the main reason I don't like knitting with acrylic: you can't block the rolling out.

So, if you haven't tried the knitted-on cast-on, I'd recommend it. Here's a video to demonstrate.