I Came Back for the Bloops

I've been having so much fun that I decided to restart this blog.

This is my version of short row knitting. My sister-in-law calls the short-row sections 'bloops,' so I've come to think of this as bloop knitting.

It isn't the same as Swing Knitting -- this is a simplified version of doing short rows, and I handle the marking very differently -- but I suppose you could say they are all part of the same short-row family.

The basic idea of bloops is to keep the number of rows the same, even when using short rows. When I made Slice of Jupiter several years ago, I didn't try to be perfect in my short rows, and just guessed at keeping the number of rows even.

Another foray into short rows was Organic Triangle, where again I wasn't systematic.

And yet, such is the forgiving nature of knitting, both of these worked well enough.

However, now it's time to get serious.

If you have blocks of color and some plain rows, a schematic of your knitting might look like this.

Short-rows take the same pattern, and simply slide it over a bit.

Note that in any given column of stitches, you still have the same number of rows.

And that is the theory, because if each column has the same number of rows, you will end up with a rectangle.

And once you have a rectangle, well, then......you can play.