cast on 217 stitches?

[LBickham]

Ok this is probably a dumb question, but I am very new to this. A pattern I have is saying to cast on 217 sts. But my needles are not long enough for this. How do I cast on that many?

[salmonmac]

if you're working with straight needles or small circular needles, you can't. You'll need a fairly long circular needle. You don't have to knit in a circle on it. You can knit back and forth just the way you would on straight needles.
Besides being able to cast on more sts, it'll also be easier on your wrists to have the sts distributed along the circular needle rather than two straight needles.

[suzeeq]

Circular needles can be used to knit flat things like blankets or seamless sweaters that have a lot of stitches, and even things that don't have lots of sts. Most people who use them a couple times don't use straight ones again.

[DogCatMom]

A crochet pattern I'm (still...) making calls for approx. 180 stitches across the width. Although the logistics of where to set up the item aren't the same, keeping track of the number of stitches is very much the same.

I put a stitch marker in every 50 stitches so that, if I were interrupted while counting, I wouldn't have to go all the way back to Stitch #1....

DCM

[suzeeq]

I cast on a bunch, then count. Did that with crochet too.

[knitcindy]

I had a pattern just like that and I had to go to a speciality yarn shop and buy circular needles that were 40" long. You might want to do the same thing. Take along the pattern with you and show it to the person behind the counter and tell him/her that you need to buy the same size needle listed only in a 36 or 40 inch circular needle.

HTH, knitcindy

[suzeeq]

A 32 or 36" needle would be long enough. I find 40" too long even when working on a throw that's 45" wide; the sts don't need to stretch all the way across and sometimes the longer cord gets in the way.