No Tugging

Sharon & I have very few hard and fast rules for knitting. We teach people British or Continental style. If you look at ten people knitting, no one has the same motion. She's a rightie and I am a leftie and we both knit Continental. My left hand is more dominant while her right hand is more dominant. When students say that they are left-handed and so will be reversing everything we point out that one of us is a rightie and the other is the leftie yet we both knit the same and that knitting takes two hands.

Our rules: put the needle in the right spot and wrap the yarn this way. For beginners we recommend that in the first week or two you have more or less the same number of stitches.

We never tell people to tug. So why do they do it? It stretches the yarn and the yarn just snaps back. It's an extra, wasted movement. No book or expert is going to tell you to tug. When the stitch is done, the stitch is done.

If you want a firmer fabric, use a smaller needle. Tugging won't get you firmer fabric.

So, why people, why?