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.