Stocking stitch - multi-coloured

This uses stocking stitch and two colours.

Looking at jumpers, this seems to be the standard technique for varying colour within a row (as opposed to having complete rows of colour). You use stotcking stitch, so the front is neat (and you ignore the messy back). You take both threads of wool along the row as you knit, and use one or the other, depending what colour is needed.

One thing to think about is what to do with the thread that you aren't using for this stitch. You can leave it out of the way, which will create a loop until you do use it. Or you can try to tuck it within the thread that you are using, to hide it slightly. Looking at the first example (back) I think I did both technqiues in different places! Since this example is a simple alternation of colours, offset by one for the next row, none of the loops are particularly long, so are acceptable.

Here are two more patterns. Since these had longer parts of a row with the same colour, I made more of an effort to tuck the unused colour inside the stitch of the used colour. It did tend to mean that at the end of each row, I had to unwind the two wools , which were now twisted round each other!

One problem with these patterns is that, while knitting, the knit row shows the pattern from the front, while the purl row shows it from the back, and you're knitting in the opposite direction. This is OK if you have a symmetrical pattern, such as these Os. It didn't stop me making a mistake, though!

These Greek keys needed more effort. I drew the pattern, but had to remember that rows went from left to right for one row, but from right to left for the next.