How To: the magic ring technique

If you like to crochet in the round, this will change your life. I've referred to it in patterns and there are hundreds of tutorials on YouTube etc, but I thought I'd add my own, just, you know, because.

So to start, make a ring with the end of your yarn.

Hold the bit where the yarn crosses in in your tension hand.  The end should point downwards and the bit that goes back to the ball of yarn should be held however you usually hold your yarn.

 Put your hook through the circle.

Yarn over.

Pull through.

At this point, it may feel a bit flimsy and tangled and you might be thinking it's all gone wrong. You're probably absolutely fine. Carry on regardless, the next step will make it feel more sturdy.

Yarn over again

Pull through

A bit better? It may still feel a bit odd. Hang in there. You now have a ring + 1 chain stitch.

Put your hook back through the ring and yarn over. It should look like there are two strands of yarn to the ring bit when you've gotten to the YO as below.  This is important. You must always make your stitches around these two strands for the magic to work. You can just see it on the pic below - from the right hand side of the picture, on the hook there is the chain stitch, the two strands of the ring and the YO.

Pull through

It will suddenly feel a lot more sturdy and familiar.  You can even let go of it, and it should hold its form, like so...

So, pick it up and yarn over

Pull through

An hey presto! A double crochet (or a single crochet, if you're on t'other side o'pond).

Now it should be pretty straight forward. Continue working your stitches into the ring until you have as many as you need. Remember to keep the tail of the yarn alongside the ring and make your stitches around both bits, as though you're trying to hide the tail. I'm going to work 6 stitches into the ring...

And now for the magic...

The point of the magic ring is that you can get a nice tight centre.

Woohoo!

So there you have it: six double (or single) crochet into a ring with a tight centre. To start your second round, work into the stitch marked with the red arrow.  If you're following my tip from earlier this week about stitch markers, your scrap of yarn goes where the purple arrow is pointing.

This is a great way of starting amigurumi patterns, hats and granny squares!  Like I said, life-changing!

How To: stitch marking

If you've been crocheting for a while, this may seem like the most basic and boring post. Sorry. If you're a beginner though, it's often helpful if someone somewhere spells out even the really basic stuff, so I hope this helps. Also, this is a bit of a cheat.  You can buy beautiful, decorative stitch markers, or plain plastic ones.  I haven't knitted enough to need stitch markers, but I can well imagine how useful the purpose-made ones are.  As a crocheter however, I find them a bit of a faff so I just use a scrap of yarn.  There's a good reason for this. Stitch markers are small fiddly things which are easily lost/vacuumed/trodden on painfully in the dark/eaten by the cat.  Scraps of yarn are in abundance.  At least, they are here.  Also, if you're working with chunky yarn, I sometimes find purpose-made stitch markers just too small.

Anyway, if you're new to this, here's how...

Grab a scrap of yarn.  A different colour is ideal and also a similar weight. I'm using super chunky here, so anything too skinny will just fall out.

When you get to the stitch you want to mark, before you make the stitch, lay the scrap of yarn alongside the previous stitch.  Hold it in place with your thumb.

View from the front side of your crochet

Tuck the other end under the hook and the yarn, round the back of your work.

View from the top of your crochet

You should be able to hold the scrap of yarn in place with your tension hand while you make the next stitch.

You actually only need to hold it in place until you can get the hook into the stitch below, then it'll stay put.  Yarn over and pull through and it will look like this...

Yarn over and pull through again to finish the stitch - I'm assuming you're working in DC (SC if you follow US terms), but obviously, this works whatever your stitch.

And that's it. Your stitch is marked and you can carry on with the round.

When you complete the round and get back to your marker, whip out the scrap of wool, wrap it round the work as you did above and carry on.  The stitch that goes in where you've just removed the marker is the first stitch of your new round.

Squaring off

When I posted about finishing the ripple blanket, I promised to show you how I squared off the ends of mine so I could put a straight border around it. That was almost a month ago! Blimey! Anyway, the ends...

As you can see, I filled in the bit between the ripple-y bit and the border with green. Here's how:

I hope that makes sense? Essentially, the increase stitches that you work at the peak of the ripples should have double crochets worked into them (single crochets if you're on t'other side of the pond, or just like US crochet terms). The decrease stitches that you work at the trough of the ripples and one stitch either side of your two decreases should have treble crochets worked into them. The stitches in between are half treble crochets (YO, through the stitch below, YO, pull through all the loops on your hook).

One end of your blanket will have a 'peak' at each corner. This is easy enough, the row should end with 2 dc. The other end will have a 'trough' at each corner. I recommend you work an extra treble into each corner. Certainly, don't count the spacer chain as the first stitch like I did (why? What was I thinking? How did I not notice until I can to photograph it?), or you'll end up with a slightly annoying hole, like this...

Finally, despite the straightening row, I did find that the ripples were still pushing through a little so that I didn't have perfectly straight ends. On a smaller project, I expect this could be blocked out. For this, I added an extra row of DC (SC) which gave it the extra stability and 'straightness' it needed.

As I type this, the snow is pelting down again, so back into the car with the ripple blanket. You know, just in case...

Pattern: Bunting Curtain Ties

It's taken me a while to get round to writing this up. Sorry! It seems I'm still sort of in holiday mode. Bloggage has certainly been light of late. Must change that. Anyway, bunting curtain ties. A nice easy little project to use up a few scraps...

I'm using the scraps from my ripple blanket and some beads salvaged from an old necklace.

Start by threading a bead on to your yarn.

Admittedly, you probably don't need a picture to help you with that bit. However, pay attention, as the bead is going to sit right at the bottom of the bunting flag, so you'll be crocheting around half of it. Sort of.

Pass the end of your yarn under the main bit to form a loop (with the bead in the loopy bit), like so...

Hold the yarn at the point where it crosses over...

Poke your hook through the gap between the yarn and the bead...

Yarn over and pull through...

...And that's the tricky bit done. It's plain sailing from here! So...

...ch3...
...5 tr...
...And it should look a bit like this...

Holding the bead, gently pull the tail of the yarn until the bead sits snug with the crochet. You need to give the bead a bit of a wiggle. It should look like this...

Right. Row 2. Turn your work and...

Ch 3 (ch does not count as first stitch), 1 tr in next 4 st. 2 tr in last st.

Still with me? It should look like this...

Row 3:

Turn your work

Ch 3 (still doesn't count as first stitch), 1 tr in next 6 st, 1 tr in top ch of foundation ch. Does that make sense? Your final row should start with a chain and then have 7 tr. Like this...

That's it! Snip your yarn and weave in the ends...

Now make another three...

Excellent! Now we just need to string them all together. And a couple of hanging loops would be a good idea, no?  I have a nice easy method for this and it has yet to fail me. So, let's grab a nice scrap of coordinating yarn and start with a chain. You'll want to leave a reasonable tail as we're going to come back later and make a nice neat 'finishing-off' with it.

Ch 14,  then sl st into the 11th chain from the hook (or the third chain from the knot, which is probably easier). It should look like this...

Then ch 5.

Again, you probably didn't need a picture to help with that bit... Anyway, it's about time we added some flags. Your next stitch will be a sc in the top of a flag. Because your last row when you were making a flag was a foundation chain + 7 tr, you should make 8 sc across the top of the flag. Like so...

Fab! Now ch 2 and do the same again...

Rinse and repeat until all four flags are strung together. Now we just need to put the loop on the other end. It's the same as the first loop, but backwards, if you get my drift. So, ch 19 the sl st in the 14th ch from the hook. Sl st in the next 2 st. This should work out so that you have 5 ch between the last sl st and the last flag you attached. Annoyingly, I didn't take a shot of this. Sorry!

Pull though the yarn and leave yourself a reasonable tail. Now, to finish off neatly, we're going to put a few stitches around the sl st join.  I find this method really useful for anything that needs a hanging loop. It's nice and strong and the ends don't work their way back out again. On the down side, it does look ever so slightly like a noose. If this bothers you, tie a knot and be done with it. If not, read on...

Let's start with the hanging loop you just made.  Thread the end of your yarn through a knitter's needle and with the loop on the left, flags on the right, pass the needle under the chain and back through the loop this makes...

As you pull the yarn through to tighten, shuffle this stitch up so that it's right next to your last sl st.

This will keep everything nice and tight in the crochet. Repeat the process a few more times, but this time when you tighten the stitch, it should go round the slip stitches.

Make three or four of these stitches. Then hide the end of the yarn under that stitches you've just made...

Snip off the end of your yarn and repeat with the loop at the other end and ta-da! That's it! One curtain tie (or, if you like, a VERY short bit of bunting).  Now go back and repeat to make the other half of the pair (assuming you've got two curtains to hold back...)

I'd show you them in situ, but by the time I'd got to this point, the sky had gone a threatening shade of grey. A shot for another post maybe. Anyway, I hope someone enjoys making these. They are kind of cute. Or you could just make loads of flags and make a long string of mini bunting.

PS - Oh, yeah, feel free to make as many of these as you like for presents, decorations, etc. but please don't sell 'em. That's just not nice, is it?

A quick sewing up cheat

Following on from the Twisted Tweble scarf in my last post, I thought you might find this little cheat kind of useful.  When it comes to working with chunky yarn, I quite often find it annoying when I get to the sewing-funky-stuff-on bit.  The yarn is a pain to squeeze through a needle (I quite often lose the bigger of my two knitter's needles, so have to botch through with the smaller one) and then I can't get needle and thread through the button hole, so end up fishing about with a tiny crochet hook instead.  I sense you nodding in agreement.  You've been there.

I know I could use a different yarn, but sometimes, I like a little conformity.  The answer, dear reader, is to split your yarn.  If you've never done it, here's how...

Chop off a length of yarn twice as long as you need.  This, incidentally, is that nice chunky twisty stuff I keep banging on about.

Split your yarn into two equal strands, a bit like you would with embroidery thread.

You'll end up with two lengths of very crinkled yarn.  Be careful with it during this bit.  You've effectively just unspun your yarn and what you're holding is quite fragile.  Now you need to put the 'spin' back in.

Taking one length of yarn, hold an end in each hand. Hold one hand still and twist the yarn a few times with your other hand.  The more you twist, the more stable/firm the yarn should feel. You'll notice the difference if you give it a (very gentle) tug.

You can either continue twisting with the one hand (which I find a bit difficult), or take a seat and do it my way.

You're doing it my way?  Great.  Still holding an end in each hand (and you'll still need to twist it a little as above) place the yarn across your lap so that your fingers are pinning one end to each leg.  Hold your left hand (and the yarn end) still.  Run your right hand down your thigh (gosh, it's all got a bit 50 Shades, hasn't it?), rolling the yarn end underneath it.  Roll the same direction that you twisted.

When you get to your knee, move the yarn back to the top of your thigh and repeat.  Don't let the yarn unravel.  You should only need to do this a couple of times (unless you have very short legs, or you're using a very long length of yarn).

Your yarn should look a bit like this.

And if you bring the ends together, it should do this.

For the next bit, you need to stretch out the yarn so that all the kinks disappear and fold it in half.  Sounds easy, doesn't it?  Yeah...

The way I do it is to pop a crochet hook between my teeth, hook facing down.  Hold the yarn so that it is under the middle of the crochet hook and bring both hands up so that they meet.  Hold both ends in one hand and use the other hand to remove the yarn from the hook. Spit out the hook.  By having the hook facing down, you should find that the yarn won't accidentally slip off the end leaving you with a big kinked knot.

Holding the two ends in one hand and the folded end in the other, you should feel the yarn naturally twisting in one direction. Let it. Don't just let go of it, rather, gently twist it between your fingers in the direction it wants to go.

There! Isn't that better?  Half the bulk of the original yarn and much easier to thread through a needle and button.  It also matches whatever you've just made. You can of course make it even thinner by splitting the original yarn into four (or even more) but be warned: it's really easy to end up with lots of little tufts of yarn as the unspun fibres are very delicate.

I hope that sort of makes sense.  I would like to have had more pictures, but both hands were already employed so a camera was out of the question. I hope you can forgive me.  Also, you've already had me gurning at you from a blog post once this week. A shot of me with my hands in the air and a crochet hook between my teeth or even worse, a thigh shot, might finish you all off.

Oh yeah, did I mention? If you're like me, you may look like a flailing, thigh-stroking loon. Best do this in private.