Tutorial Tuesday: Cable Knit Headband
It’s been a long time since I’ve done a tutorial! This one is more of a pattern than a tutorial, but I thought it was too good not to share. This headband knits up super quick because it’s made with chunky yarn, and the cables make it look a lot more complicated than it actually is. Never done cables? They’re easy, I promise! I thought they were hard until the first time I tried them, and then my reaction was something like, “Is this all there is to it?”
The first version of this headband was actually the black one, using leftover yarn from the hat I made Steven for Christmas. I had just barely enough yarn, but when I finished I realized that the cables wouldn’t really show up on the black yarn, so I bought another ball of yarn and made another in the gray.
The black one is blocked and the gray one isn’t, which is why the cables are more 3D on the gray one. If you want your cables to lie flat, block, if not, well, I won’t tell anyone you skipped it, but your headband won’t be quite as wide.
Materials:
1 ball Cascade Yarns Lana Grande yarn (87 yards/100grams)
Size 10.5 knitting needles
Cable needle
Yarn needle for seaming
Methods:
I’m going to commit knitting blasphemy and tell you that it’s totally unnecessary to swatch for this project. Just knit the first couple of rows and see if it looks wide enough to cover your ears.
k=knit
cn=cable needle
p=purl
sl sts=slip stitches
Cast on 13 stitches.
Follow this stitch pattern:
Row 1: k13
Row 2: K2, p9, k2.
Row 3: k2, sl next 3 sts to cn and hold in front, k3, k3 from cn, k5.
Row 4: K2, p9, k2.
Row 5: k13
Row 6: K2, p9, k2.
Row 7: k5, sl next 3 sts to cn and hold in back, k3, k3 from cn, k2.
Row 8: K2, p9, k2.
Rep Rows 1–8 14 times, or to the desired length. (I recommend making it pretty tight, because it’ll stretch, and you want it to stay on your head!)
Bind off, seam the short ends, and you’re done!
If you’re a Ravelry member, here is the Ravelry project page.
Looking for more tutorials and DIY projects? Check out my What I Made page!
Ooh that’s pretty! Perfect for winter-especially if I can pull it over my ears! Thanks so much, I’ll be linking as well.
yay-thank you so much for this easy pattern! my sister was just complaining that I needed to make her ear warmers and I got to cable for the first time too
Yay, I hope your sister likes it! Thank you :-)
Rachel, for those of us who don’t know how to knit, do you think we can achieve this by cutting up + stitching up an arm of an old sweater?
Rue, I’m sure you could! In fact, I know I’ve seen tutorials for that very project. You’d probably want to felt the sweater first, so it wouldn’t unravel. If you could gets your hands on one you’d be willing to sacrifice, I’m sure a cashmere sweater would make a luxurious headband.
Thankyouthankyouthankyou! This will make an awesome Christmas present, it’s easy enough for a newbie like me to understand and it is so pretty. Thanks!
Hi there! I’m having a little difficulty with this pattern (this is my first time trying cables!). I followed your pattern exactly (or so I think) but it looks a bit different than your pictures. Instead of having that “braided” look, it looks more like there’s only one, repeating, swooping cable. I hope that makes sense! Any ideas??
Hi RachelG, sorry you’re having trouble! The only thing I can think of is that maybe you didn’t switch which side of the knitting you were holding the cable needle on. So in row 3 you should be holding it in front of the rest of the stitches, and in row 7 it should be behind them. Here are some pictures of what I mean. Front: http://www.aokcorral.com/projects/howtocable.htm Back: http://www.aokcorral.com/projects/howtocablepart2.htm
Let me know if this helps!
Yep, you’re absolutely right!! I definitely was not doing that. I tried it again the right way and it looks perfect :) thank you so much!! Next time I better pay closer attention to instructions!!
So glad I could help and that you figured it out. And now you know how to do cables, yay!