In the video tutorial shown below I will demonstrate how to knit '1 over 2' cables, which are created when you cross one stitch over two other stitches to produce a narrow cable (1 stitch wide).

I'll show you 4 different '1 over 2' cables in the video, including purl crosses which is where a knit stitch is crossed over two purl stitches. Purl crosses are usually used on a reverse stockinette stitch background, because the right side of reverse stockinette stitch is formed from purl stitches.

These cables are called traveling cables because they are individual cable strands that only cross over the background stitches, rather than cross over other cable strands. They therefore can travel independently, wherever they want to, over the surface of the knitting.

Even though they both create a cable that is 1 stitch wide, an important difference between 1/2 and 1/1 cables (for example) is the angle of the cable. This is due to the 1/1 cable moving over 1 background stitch only, whilst the 1/2 cable moves over 2 background stitches at a time.