BEGINNERS KNITTING COURSE
BASIC PURL STITCH
Once you have mastered both the knit and purl stitches you will have opened yourself to endless possibilities of things you can create.
A purl stitch is essentially the exact opposite of a knit stitch. With a knit stitch, the front of your work will look like a "v" shape, and the back will look like a bump. But when you purl, the front of your work will look like a bump, and the back will look like a "v".
In a knitting pattern, you will often see purl represented by a "p". So when a pattern says, for example, p3, then you would purl for three consecutive stitches.
Below you will learn how to master the art of a basic purl stitch.
Step 1
Begin with the working yarn in front of the needle. This is different from the basic knit stitch, where we began with the working yarn in the back of the needles.
Step 2
With your right hand needle, enter the stitch on the left hand needle from the top of the stitch. When we created a knit stitch we entered from the bottom of the stitch.
"In under the fence"
Step 3
Take the yarn in your right hand and wrap the yarn from the front to the back.
"Grab that sheep!"
Step 4
With your right hand needle, push that loop of yarn that you just wrapped around the needle, down and back through the middle of the stitch on the left needle.
"Back Under the Fence"
Step 5
Slide the stitch off the left needle and will be left with a new stitch on your right needle.
"And off we leap!"
Repeat Steps 1-5 to continue to purl as long as the pattern requires.