If you enjoy knitting tight, twisted stitches off of a tiny curved piece of metal, this blog post isn’t for you. If you, on the other hand, have worked cables before and felt a tad uncomfortable or confused, or maybe you found yourself wondering what contortionist invented cables, anyway… you’re in the right place!
The key to happy cabling, in this knitter’s opinion, is swapping those clumsy cable needles for Double Pointed Needles (DPN).
Here’s why:
There’s a reason knitting needles aren’t shaped like a wonky letter “U”. It’s awkward to knit from that shape. DPN are easier to hold and knit off of than nearly any other cable needle.
It’s also a known fact that couch cushions and car/train/airplane seats are the black holes of knitting supplies. Just ask all my stitch markers. Since there are four to five DPN per package, you’ll have some to spare in case you lose one.
DPN are actual knitting needles, so you can use the same size DPN for cabling as your knitting needle! Anyone who’s ever gotten one of those three-packs of cable needles with small, medium, and large sizes can tell you: it seems so convenient and thoughtful to have subtly different sized cable needles, but none of them are ever just right. With DPN, there’s no more guesswork about what size cable needle to use.
Furthermore, DPN’s come in long and short lengths; you can choose your preference depending on the number of stitches on your cable. What cable needle can give you THAT amount of control?!
And in closing, I’m obviously going to reference TV personality and chef Alton Brown, who refers to random kitchen gadgets that only perform one function as “uni-taskers”. The tasks these tools perform can easily be done with other, more useful and universal tools. Cable needles are uni-taskers. Mic drop.
So, the next time you are working on a cable project, give a double pointed needle a try instead of a cable needle and see what you think.
(Do you have thoughts too? Drop me a line in the comments!)