Knitting Diamonds, Part 1

I like diamonds.  Not the stone, not that I could afford one anyway, but the knitted shape.  They’re just so blasted hard to figure out how to properly knit them so they come out . . . well, not square, but you know what I mean.  I get flattened ones, elongated ones, ones that have more or less corners than I want . . . well, and other things.  The worst part is that I like diamonds so much that I often pick out patterns that feature diamonds.  Then, being me, I don’t like the diamonds in the pattern and want to substitute my own.  But then I run into the same problem again.  So.

Since I have just done this twice recently with two very different ways of making knitted diamonds, I decided to share my ideas, not as a clothing pattern, but stitch pattern.  Here goes.

As you can see, the cables are only one stitch wide, and they travel to make the diamonds.  Cabled diamonds are lovely because they make a clear pattern, but they aren’t lace, so they don’t have holes to let the cold in.

Also, I started charting the diamond cable pattern in Excel, and got frustrated trying to figure out how to use the symbols I had available to fill in the chart.  I googled ‘knitting chart maker’, and found this totally awesome site!  Knitting Chart Maker by Jacquie is a point and click knitting chart maker!  It’s so easy!  And then it removes all the extra bits so you can take an uncluttered screen shot, and print (or post) your pattern!  Jacquie, whover s/he is, is just wonderful and generous to share such a cool program.

The pattern on the socks is an eight-stitch repeat and the number of stitches can easily be expanded, although I wouldn’t make it much smaller.  Knit flat, the cabling happens every right side row.  It’s an eight-stitch repeat, and a sisxteen-row repeat.

The tricky part about cables is that they usually require a cable needle to hold some of the stitches out of the way to create the crosses.  With only one stitch per cable, there’s an easier way that doesn’t need a cable needle.  Let me see if I can write this out clearly.  And I have pictures!

There are two types of cable crosses used here, one slanting left and one slanting right.  They are not made in the same way!  Both are pretty easy, but I have to pay attention to make sure I do the correct one!

Right cross: knit to one stitch before the cable stitch.  Pass two stitches from the left needle to the right needle as if to knit-two-together, but do not knit them.  The cable stitch is now the second stitch from the end of the right needle.

Pass the two stitches back to the left needle.  Knit one stitch (the cable stitch) through the back loop.

Knit the second stitch through the back loop.  This is a right-cross cable.

Left cross: knit to the cable stitch.  Pass the cable stitch to the right needle as if to knit, but do not knit.  Pass the next stitch to the right needle knitwise.

Pass both stitches back to the right needle.  Knit the SECOND stitch on the left needle through the back loop, but don’t remove it from the left needle.

Knit the first stitch (the cable stitch) on the left needle through the back loop, and remove both stitches from the left needle.

Congratulations!  You have knit one stitch cables!  Now knit some more!