I’ve always found ‘frogging’ (i.e., the act of undoing knit or crochet stitches) to be a slightly stressful scenario. After all, you’re undoing something that might have taken hours to do, and it can feel bittersweet to take away all that progress, even if you are fixing something. However, when I was introduced to a new cabling technique that involves dropping stitches, I was immediately intrigued!

• Stitch marker
• Appropriate weight yarn
• The appropriate gauge needles (either DPN or circular)
• The appropriate gauge crochet hook (optional)

Tutorial by Jessica at Jessica McDonald Designs

Unlike many other techniques, the dropped cable stitch is actually added after all the desired rows have been worked, but before casting off or moving on to another section. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize this in the moment, so I don’t have many progress pictures of my project before adding the cable, so here is my best attempt at cropping out a relevant section. You can see that it almost looks like ribbing, with two columns of stitches standing out in the middle of the picture. Those columns are then dropped while the rest of the stitches remain on the needles. I just want to note that a stitch marker is missing in my picture, and a stitch marker is crucial in this technique, as it prevents you from dropping more stitches than required.

After the stitches are dropped, you can use a crochet hook to begin creating the braided look. Because the yarn I was using was so bulky, I just used my hands. You want to bring each bundle of yarn up and through the previous loops. As you can see, it creates a unique cable look that helps to add texture and interest to any given project.

Apart from the shocking difference in colour saturation due to lighting between the two pictures, I hope that helps to illustrate the before and after of this technique!

Honestly, I could see this technique being really adorable in a chunky heirloom blanket! It’s simpler than creating a braid with normal cabling techniques that involve holding stitches in front/behind others, as you can just knit like normal until it is time to drop the stitches. I haven’t had the motivation to try designing anything in a while, but new techniques like this always help to spark that side of me. What about you? Are there projects or ideas that have been circulating in your mind lately?

Until next time, happy crafting!