Today’s thesis: it’s amazing how many hair products are also useful in knitting. No seriously, hear me out.
I posted a tip on Instagram about using elasticated hairbands to secure your circular needles when your knitting is squished into the bottom of your handbag. As your knit-in-progress languishes down there in the dark, stitches slip from the needles amongst the till receipts, samples of oolitic limestone, and tulip bulbs. (What? Why are you looking at me like that?!)
I bought a couple of tools that semi-solved the problem, but they were a minor faff to use. Also, I had to remember to carry them with me, and my ability to remember stuff is… imperfect.
Then one day I realized that an easy, reliable solution was quite literally within my grasp. Elasticated hairbands. If I’m not wearing one, there’s one around my wrist, or in my bag. To secure circular needles, wrap a hairband around the two cables just below where they join the needles, make a loop and pull through tightly. Ta-da! It really works, although some types of hairband are better than others. So now my hair is a mess, but my knitting is tidy.
Actually, most of the quick knitting hints I’ve shared over the years have been hair-product-related. Perhaps this shouldn’t be surprising: these things are designed to tame, restrain, shape, and manage unruly hair – it makes sense that they also have their uses with unruly yarn.
So in addition to the above, here are five more yarny tips that use products more usually seen in your hair. If you know me in real life (hi Mum), you may say, “I’m not taking advice from someone whose hair looks like a musk ox that’s been back-combed” and I can’t deny that you might have a point, but these tips are very much for your knitting and other yarnery:-
2. Claw-grips as mini yarn-ball holders. As someone whose hair is reliably unreliable, I have a lot of these:-
They’re reasonably useful for hair, but they’re extremely useful for managing a gazillion small balls of yarn in intarsia.
They can grip whichever balls of yarn you’re not currently using, and if you’re struggling with all 80 bobbins tangling, they can even grip small balls of yarn directly to your knitting.
The above two tips are my own invention, but the next two ideas have come from other people.
3. Hairspray. You know that feeling when you’re due to attend a yarny event in about half an hour’s time, but you haven’t quite finished knitting the Fair Isle skirt that you designed for the occasion? Yeah, me too my friend, me too.
Even if you get to the point of casting off, that leaves eleventy million ends that you haven’t woven in. When this happened to me, I was with Sarah Neal (editor of Let’s Knit magazine), and she told me that hairspraying the ends will keep them in place for the short term. She wasn’t wrong. Five years later, and I still wear the skirt, and I still haven’t woven in the ends. (Oops, did I just confess that out loud?)
4. Another one that’s not mine. Have you ever knitted/crocheted a garment of exquisite beauty but struggled to wear it because *whispers* the yarn is a bit too scratchy? It’s OK, you’re amongst friends, you can be honest here. It’s probably happened to most of us at some point. Please don’t give up on this gorgeous-yet-uncomfortable object. Simply wash in water with a little hair conditioner, and your yarn will soften. Easy!
5. Stitch markers. We all need them. We all fail to have them to hand at the right moment. After plenty of years of experience, I can confirm that kirby grips (for knitting and crochet) and elastic hairbands (for knitting) work just perfectly.
6. Whilst we’re discussing hair products, we may as well include things designed to remove excess hair. If you’ve knitted something in yarn prone to pilling, use a razor to remove those little felty blobs of yuck.
(This is a camera strap. Free pattern is right here.)
Those are the main ones that come to mind. Perhaps you have others?
This blog post is only here because of the efforts of my friend, the Webscape Gardener, who stepped in to help when this whole site mysteriously imploded yesterday. Thank you Alice – you’re above-averagely awesome.
Your advise is always welcome. Thanks for the advise, especially the hair spray,
You’re very welcome. ????
Spiral hair ties can be cut up to wrap around your needles to keep them together. Clover (I think) do make something for knitting needles, but hair ties are a lot cheaper.
Like it! Thanks for the tip!
Love this tip bc i bought some of those spiral bobble hair ties and they just dont work for me, and now they wont need to sit wasted and languishing in the back of my haircare drawer.
Oh my; what is that beautiful colour work that you are knitting in greens and red? It looks amazing!
Thank you! It’s a design for the book. Stylecraft Dreamcatcher.
Oh thank all the Deities of Knitdom – for one horrible moment I thought you were going all Georgian mourners on us and suggesting we knit trinkets from our own hair – sheep/bunny/alpaca locks are fine but human hair would bring on the heebie-jeebies for me! Thanks for the tips – and the beautiful robin pics – I amazed you find time to knit between feeds!
Ha ha ha ha ha! Now you’re giving me ideas for new blog posts…
Hahaha! I joke that I knit with dog hair, but that is only a half-truth. He sheds so often times, if he lays on my knitting, I’ll get floof in my project.
Nah, not a clue about hair products .. owing to having had a No. 3 clipper-job a few weeks back. 😀
My problem with hair, as of about five or six years ago, is growing it out again: it comes to look as if someone has gone over it with a lawn edge-trimmer, and I just can’t bear it. So I sigh, and have another clipper-job.
Phil, à propos of nothing, are you also a brioche knitter ?
Hair: it’s a nightmare. *sigh* I think you may have the right approach. As for brioche, I’ve done a little, and will do more when I have time, because I LOVE what it can achieve. You?
Trying (VERY, as some have been heard to utter). The choice of colours is my main problem at the moment. Currently gone back to making the shawl thingy I should’ve made when I did an online course – great teacher, she was; and not even Nancy Marchant ! 😀
Very glad we got it sorted – we would all miss you terribly if we couldn’t read your blog. And thank you for the hair-related tips! x
Thank you SO much for your help. I will reply to your email, honest!
Oh I knew I wasn’t the only one using hair things in work! Thanks dear, now I feel a lot less worried about what my kids will , nah, do think about me. My thread snapped from the luxaflex and those clips keep them up now. Problem sloved. And indeed hairbands work perfectly to keep things together, yarn, needles, hooks. I loose mine so a hairband keeps them together during a trip. They tent to slip through my bag and as a cluster of hooks it happens less or I see them sooner on the floor of the car. I doubt my sons will thank me from lending their razors but hé, I’ve got to do the sweaters XD And unruly hair, sigh, I think we’ve to live with it.
???????? We think alike!
I have one! I have one! I recently read that baby shampoo can be used in lieu of SOAK.
My VERY big grin! –> 😀
I do enjoy your posts. Robin’s cool too. Now if you could steer me to a beginner’s sock pattern that’s knitted in a single color and NO fancy stitches, I’d be much obliged.
Be well.
Ooh, thank you, I’m going to try that. As for basic socks, I can recommend Ann Budd’s book on knitting socks.
I agree with you on Ann Budd’s book for beginner sock knitting; she really breaks it down beautifully and covers toe up and top down.
Thank you.
Thank you! I think I’m ready to go beyond hats and scarves but the tens of sock patterns I find are too complex.
Oops! You’re welcome. I discovered the tip on another knitter’s blog. Knitters are such generous people.
Try Winwick Mum (blog, book, etc) for basic socks…
Isabel, I tried Winwick Mum because she does the knit-alongs but she confuses me. She assumes I know more than I do, sadly. I think she said I need 2.5 AND 3.0 mm circular AND DPN. But aren’t they the same? I’m congested so am getting less oxygen which makes me feel dull witted and slow. LOL. I want a beginner’s sock pattern that does not require changing yarn for stripes, knowing how to do complex things like argyle or kitchner. cables, etc. I’ll try the book. Thanks for responding.
Awesome tips. Hair conditioner for scratchy wool!! I really hope that works.
It does help, honest!
Another lovely smile-inducing post. Love all the Robyn pix and your skirt is lovely. Rather like those boots too! It’s always good to pick up sensible and simple tips for common problems with our yarny work. As ever, thankyou.
You’re extremely welcome. And thank you for such kind words.
I never knew that bobby pins were kirby grips across the pond. Do you suppose Kirby and Bobby knew each other?
I put a hook sort of bend in a hairpin to create a cable needle for sock cables that can then be pinned in securely so it doesn’t get lost between rounds. (I’m working on DNA socks that have 1-2 cables every round.) Bobby pins were too thick with the flat edges they have, hair pins are round, thin, and have cushioned ends. (Which is why paper clips didn’t work.)
I thought this was going to be a blog post about how hair always get knitted inside wips (and cat hair, and boyfriend hair, and I swear I once knitted one of my bald dad’s hair into a scarf)
The inginuity (sp?) of knitters never ceases to amaze me…for those of us who can do the magic thing with pointy sticks and string we seem to be able to find uses for all sorts of household things… I’ve used yogurt pots as yarn bowls, and toilet rolls as the inside of centre pull balls. Thanks for the further tips…my daughter has a habit of leaving hair bands around the house so I’m thinking some of them may be repurposed…! Lovely to see Robyn again.
Great post. There is another tip for your list. The snappy hair grips, the ones that you crack backwards on themselves to fasten or undo, are brilliant for holding the ends of balls of yarn in your stash. There are a gazillion on a card for £1 in the Pound shop.
I absolutely love your knitted skirt. Did you use a pattern?
I am definitely trying the conditioner tip. I made a cowl in gorgeous alpaca yarn, beautiful colours, but I can’t stand it scratching my neck! Hopefully that will sort it.
Loom bands are good for keeping needle tips together too. (Thanks Danielle for that one) Sadly this only uses a tiny few of the millions still lurking from 5 years ago…
Thanks for the hair product tips. Alas they are a few years too late as Daughter (flowing blonde locks, not jealous. At. All.) left home years ago and I keep mine (dark brown but greying rapidly) short because so much easier!
But – something I find useful: Stitch markers, those you thread onto your needles, are lovely but often heavy and have a nasty tendency to drop off when you aren’t looking. Then go right to the mostly inaccessible bottom of my (knitting) chair. I now tie short lengths of cotton yarn in a contrasting colour into loops. They still try to fall off, but not because they’re heavy, and are dead easy to replace. Plus doing so doesn’t break the bank. (More to spend on yarn!)
Great tips. I have used some of them myself. We have a brand of hair elastics that are literally small elastics with no fabric cover. They are smaller than a dime and in all colors. I have used these to hold my needles together in my bag, as well as keep dpn sets together in my needle case. They also make great stitch markers; I’ll use one color for the project with a different color for the beginning of round.
I love the skirt, by the way!
Now I have to try the hairspray!
I am smitten by the garment and yarns. I hope they will be in your book!
I use those claw clamps to hold edges together for seaming. They’re especially nice for trying on a garment to check the fit before seaming.
Very true. Also should you inadvertently shrink your favourite linen sundress a soak in straightening hair conditioner restores a good few inches of length to it. ????