Learning to knit starting to knit

This is for those of you who wish to learn to knit and for anyone who wants a refresher course as it has been so long since they did any. There are many ways to cast on but for simplicity, I am only going to show you one which gives a nice firm and tidy edge and is easy to do. Likewise, I am not going to tell you how to hold your needles as you will find the way that is most comfortable for you as you learn.
The pictures are taken from a face on perspective so that you can sit in front of your screen and copy as you read - in theory Laughing

STARTING TO KNIT
Insert the righthand needle into the first stitch on the lefthand needle from front to back

Wrap the yarn around the righthand needle exactly as before

use the righthand needle to pull through a loop of yarn as before

Keeping this stitch on the right hand needle, gently slide the stitch just worked right off the left hand needle. You should now have one stitch on the righthand needle and one less on the lefthand needle.

Insert the righthand needle into the next stitch on the lefthand needle

Wrap the yarn around the righthand needle as before and make another stitch carefully slipping the second stitch off the lefthand needle leaving you with two stitches on your righthand needle and two less on the lefthand one.

Continue working along the row like this until the end.

The following sequence is just the same process but with the knitting a few rows further on. I thought the pictures showed a bit more detail and hope it will be helpful

You can continue knitting in this way, row after row which will give you the pattern known as Garter stitch. For those of you who wish to continue and learn Purl stitch, that follows.

This article was submitted by Julie