Meg Swanson on untidy cables

Re-posting this from way back because I think it is useful

Q: I`m a knitter since many years from Sweden and I have a problem with cables. The left side of the cable and the following purl stiches gets looser than the right side cable, stiches. I have tried to knit harder on the left side but I can´t get them good enough. This makes me avoid cabled patterns although I like them. I have have asked different knitters and some just don´t understand the problem others sais tighten your knitting but it must be something I do wrong.

A: Dear Anki,
Your problem is a very common one – and you are not doing anything ‘wrong’. There are several things you can try to tighten that last cable stitch:

• Wrap the wool the ‘wrong’ way round the needle, which will use a tiny bit less length of wool. Next time you meet that stitch, it will be backward on the needle, so knit into the back of it – and wrap the wool the wrong way again, etc. OR
• Some knitters purl-into-the-back of the purl stitch that follows the last knit stitch. OR
• Amy Detjen invented this trick: when you have 2 knit stitches remaining on the Left needle (from the cable, or even just k2, p2 ribbing): knit one, but do not remove it from the L needle; knit the second stitch and slide them both off together. This transfers the looseness to the penultimate stitch, which has a better chance to even itself out unobtrusively.

I hope one of those will work for you…