Have you ever come across a knitting pattern that tells you to “hold the yarn doubled” or “use doubled throughout”? Many patterns make this request, but what does it mean? I remember coming across this for the first time and thinking huh? Thankfully, while it might sound fancy, it’s actually not that difficult, especially when you have the right free knitting tutorials at your disposal.
Holding yarn doubled or holding doubled throughout simply means to knit with two strands of yarn as though they were one strand. Depending on the pattern, you might be required to do this with one skein or two. If the pattern only calls for one skein, simply knit with a piece of the yarn from the middle of the skein, and a piece of the yarn from the end of the skein. As you cast on with both strands, hold each strand together as they were one piece of yarn.
If your pattern calls for two skeins of yarn while knitting double throughout, then use a strand from each skein at the same time. Again, you will treat both strands as if they were a single strand while knitting.
Here are a few stitches I knit using this method:
Once I cast on a few stitches with two strands of yarn, I knit them normally as if each double strand was one piece. Insert your right needle into the first stitch on the left. Because you knit with two strands, this stitch will look like two loops in one. Wrap the two strands from the skein around the needle and pull the yarn through the loop as you normally would for a knit stitch.
Here is what a few rows of knitting with two strands looks like – isn’t it nice and bulky?
Have you made any projects using this method?