Knitting lends itself to horizontal stripes. All you have to do is grab a new color of yarn, and you’re all set. But horizontal lines can feel…slightly trickier. They’re not though, I promise! And once you have the hang of them, you can use them for all sorts of things.

I’m making this (entirely to take a picture of it to use it for an upcoming scheme…more about this later), and it seemed like a perfect chance to show you just how easy it is to add a vertical line in to your knitting. You can watch me do it here on patreon or here on instagram.

And once you have the hang of them, you can do with them pretty much anything you can do with any other column of knitting. Send them wandering off to the left or right, use them for cables, use them for lace, make sweet little doodlybops…whatever strikes your fancy.

It’s what I did on Unfurl (the hat that came out at the beginning of the week, it’s over here for Rampant & Notable Nonsense folks). And I’ve used it in the past for parts of Expound and Delineated (which are currently here and here, also for Rampant & Notable Nonsense folks).

Now, speaking of the little doodlybops (no, I don’t have a proper name for them, does anyone else? I called them buds on the Unfurl pattern, but in my head they are and shall forever be a random nonsense word pulled from the depths of my brain that day), should we talk about how to do those next? Because oh but I think they work nicely with a vertical line of stitches, and I bet I’m not the only one who feels like that!

Have you ever done vertical stripes on your knitting? Do you want to? If you want to and it feels scary, what is giving you pause…I might be able to talk you into trying it!