mini stop-twisting-stitches tutorial (ignore cat)

new knitters constantly get told they're twisting their stitches and imo they are usually given confusing information on how to correct it. It's generally important to correct it bc twisted stitches mess up your gauge and produce fabric with a strong bias to it.

But usually people will say things like "you're wrapping your yarn the wrong way". This is not helpful in my opinion because wrapping your yarn the wrong way is not what twists your stitches.

The way you wrap your yarn changes the way the stitches are mounted on the needles. The way you knit or purl into those mounted stitches is what twists them.

The standard way stitches are mounted is with the "leading leg" in the front of the work. One leg of the loop will always have further to travel than the other and will therefore be closer to the needle tips than the other. The standard way to have stitches mounted will have that leg in the front of the work (closest to me). You see how if I put my needle through the front to knit, I have this large upside-down U gap of an open, untwisted knit stitch between my needles.

This is a stitch mounted the opposite way. This is what people mean when they say you wrapped your yarn wrong - on the *previous* row, the way you wrap your yarn changes the mount of the stitch. You see how the longer side of the loop, the one closest to the needle tips, is in the back.

Importantly: this stitch is NOT TWISTED YET.

But now if I put my needle through the front loop, it makes a cross. If I knit this way, my stitch will be twisted!

Here it is again without the red line. You see how it is not open.

You don't need to change the mount of your stitch to knit it untwisted, though. Just work through the back loop

Knitting through the back loop of that same stitch. We see the open U again! The resulting stitch will not be twisted.

If you don't want twisted stitches, you want to knit/purl into the longest leg of the loop.

And again - the way you wrap your yarn affects the mount of the stitches. The way you knit or purl into them is what makes them twisted or not.

It's the same with purls

Purling through the leading leg of a "standard" mounted stitch. This stitch will not be twisted

A stitch mounted with the leading leg in the back

If I purl through the front like this, it will be twisted

However if I purl through the back loop, it will not be twisted

I have not shown how I wrap the yarn bc again, it doesn't really matter. For example, I commonly wrap my yarn "the wrong way" when I purl, resulting in those backwards mounted stitches on the needle. So on the next row I work them through their back loops.