If you’re a knitter and you know my Natty Knits toys you’ll know that they’re all made using a technique called Short Row Shaping. This involves turning the knitting around before you’ve knitted to the end of the row, so making the knitted fabric 3 dimensional. However, when you turn the knitting, you leave a small hole. This blog post demonstrates how to close these holes to get a smoother finish on your knitting.
All my original patterns can be knitted without using this technique, if you don’t close the holes the knitting will look like this:
It’s a small hole and I’m actually stretching the fabric in this photo to make it look bigger. If you’re knitting in a natural fibre and intend to felt the finished item, then these holes won’t even show up.
But there is a way to close the holes so that it looks like this:
Can you see where the two knitted rows merge into one? There’s no hole there now.
This is how you close those holes.
Every time you turn the work mid row to make a short row, you make a yarn forward and it makes a little loop under the stitch. Essentially what you will do is knit into this loop as well as the stitch above it.
When you knit back towards a short row end from a previous row it will look like this:
There’s a very noticeable gap after the stitch with the loop under it. (It’s so noticeable in fact that I’ve knitted short rows by candlelight.) When you get to that last stitch before the gap you’ll need to find the loop under the stitch, use the right needle to pick up the loop from right to left and front to back, like this:
Then with the loop still on your right needle, knit into the stitch above as normal, it’s almost like knitting two stitches together, like this:
And that’s how you do it. Easy. This is obviously only the way to pick up the loop on a knit row, if you’re working in stockinette stitch it’s a different matter (I’m working on a second blog post about short rows in stockinette stitch)
So now you know how to make un-holey short row shaping, check out the patterns in the Natty Knits shop, they’re great to practice this method on.
Natty Knitter 
[…] Knit Chicks are made using a technique called Short Row Shaping. This involves turning the knitting around before you’ve knitted to the end of the row, so making the knitted fabric 3 dimensional. However, when you turn the knitting, you leave a small hole. This blog post demonstrates how to close these holes to get a smoother finish on your knitting. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes just here […]
[…] The Spiders are made using a technique called Short Row Shaping. This involves turning the knitting around before you’ve knitted to the end of the row, so making the knitted fabric 3 dimensional. However, when you turn the knitting, you leave a small hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish on your fabric just here […]
[…] Knit Chicks are made using a technique called Short Row Shaping. This involves turning the knitting around before you’ve knitted to the end of the row, so making the knitted fabric 3 dimensional. However, when you turn the knitting, you leave a small hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish just here […]
[…] So I’ve changed all the short row patterns for sale to now include this note at the beginning: NOTE: This pattern is knitted with Short Row Shaping, each “yarn forward and turn work” creates a loop of yarn under the stitch. When knitting back over a stitch with a loop under it, the loop must be knitted into, at the same time as the stitch above it. Please see photos 1 and 2 for how this looks, or there’s a full explanation of how to do this in this blog post: https://nattyknitter.wordpress.com/2009/07/25/advanced-short-row-shaping-how-to-close-the-holes/ […]
[…] The knitted teeth are difficult to get the hang of, although all the knitters who tested this pattern have said that once they understood the method they were able to finish the teeth quickly and easily. If you need more help with the short rows, I’ve written a more in depth tutorial which you’ll find here. […]
[…] The Hen pattern uses a technique called short row shaping. A short row is made when you turn your knitting before the end of a row. This means that some sections of your work will have more rows than others. The sections with more rows will arch, creating a three-dimensional shape. Each time you turn your knitting before the end of a row you create a loop of yarn under a stitch and a small hole in the fabric. So, when you knit back over a stitch that has a loop under it, you must knit into the loop at the same time as the stitch above it to close the hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish just here. […]
[…] The Hedgehog Family pattern uses a technique called short row shaping. A short row is made when you turn your knitting before the end of a row. This means that some sections of your work will have more rows than others. The sections with more rows will arch, creating a three-dimensional shape. Each time you turn your knitting before the end of a row you create a loop of yarn under a stitch and a small hole in the fabric. So, when you knit back over a stitch that has a loop under it, you must knit into the loop at the same time as the stitch above it to close the hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish just here. […]
[…] The Robot pattern uses a technique called short row shaping. A short row is made when you turn your knitting before the end of a row. This means that some sections of your work will have more rows than others. The sections with more rows will arch, creating a three-dimensional shape. Each time you turn your knitting before the end of a row you create a loop of yarn under a stitch and a small hole in the fabric. So, when you knit back over a stitch that has a loop under it, you must knit into the loop at the same time as the stitch above it to close the hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish just here. […]
[…] This pattern uses a technique called short row shaping. A short row is made when you turn your knitting before the end of a row. This means that some sections of your work will have more rows than others. The sections with more rows will arch, creating a three-dimensional shape. Each time you turn your knitting before the end of a row you create a loop of yarn under a stitch and a small hole in the fabric. So, when you knit back over a stitch that has a loop under it, you must knit into the loop at the same time as the stitch above it to close the hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish just here. […]
[…] close the hole. There’s a special blog post on how to close the holes and get a smoother finish just here. In that last tail bind off row, I would suggest picking the loop up onto the needle to make it […]
I think I may be a little confused…. do I knit the stitch in front of the gap then pick up the loop and next stitch and knit through those 2, or do I pick up the loop and the stitch in front of the gap and knit through those 2? The football is so adorable and I would love to make it for my nephew, just need to figure out the whole YFWD thing….
Hello Valerie!
Thanks for your comment, you’re right first time, you knit the stitch before the gap, then pick up the loop and the next stitch and knit them together. I hope that helps.
[…] a longer explanation about picking up the loop created by turning the work, just here. But you might also want to try German Short Rows, I just heard about them from one of the pattern […]