Knitting onto DPNs

[Murron]

I'm running into a problem for a project I'm doing now that I've done once before and am not sure how I got it right the first time!

I'm making a baby beanie that says to switch over to DPNs (from circular) when necessary. When I did it the first time, I was knitting in the round row after row and it looked great. And even when I switched over to DPNs, it continued to look the same way, with the little Vs.

HOWEVER, I'm now making another one and when I duplicate the process and switch over to DPNs, it comes out like the garter stitch, rather than the little Vs that it had when knitting on circulars. What am I doing wrong??

[Ingrid]

Does the inside of the hat have the stockinette v's? If so, you're probably knitting on the inside of the hat rather than the outside. The working needles should be closest to you and the other two away from you.

If it's true garter, are you knitting one row and purling one row? You only have to work knit stitches for stockinette in the round.

[Murron]

I looked on the inside of the hat and it's garter stitch throughout until I switched to DPNs and now it's got the Vs from where I'm knitting there.

When I was on circular, it was knitting every row, not the p1 row, k1 row.

[Ingrid]

In garter stitch, you have ridges of purl on both sides.

In stockinette stitch, the purl bumps are on the inside and the v's are on the outside.

In reverse stockinette stitch, the bumps are on the outside and the v's are on the inside.

I think the terminology is what's confusing me. You can't get garter stitch in the round unless you purl a round. I suspect that you've got stockinette for part of your hat and reverse stockinette for the other part. It has to do with were you're needles are. You should be knitting on the outside of the hat to get the v's all on the outside.

[Murron]

Sorry about my terminology. Okay, so the pattern read to knit garter stitch for 1". Now on circulars, this mean, k1 row, p1 row, correct? Then it said to knit stockinette for 3", which is knit every row.

So I did that.
And then when I switched to DPNs, it started looking like garter stitch (bumps, no Vs). So does this mean I didn't put the stitches on correctly onto the DPNs? I put them on purlwise. Is that wrong?

Thanks very much for all your help!!

[Ingrid]

OK, I think I get it. Garter stitch often looks a lot like reverse st st.

To be honest, though, if you're getting true garter on both the inside and outside with the dpns without purling, I haven't a clue what's going on. If your v's are turning up on the inside then you need to spin the work around so your needles are close to you. You'll have to take out the stitches you've done, but all of us have had to do that.

You switched correctly, but I think you're knitting on the inside of the hat now, which is a matter of where you're holding the needles.

[Murron]

You're absolutely right! I just figured out that I was knitting the hat inside out. Thanks for the help!

[rebecca]

Perhaps if u look @ this site you will see how to hold your needles correctly, as Ingrid explained. LOL, I've done the same thing