Expert: Marla - 4/2/2010

Question
QUESTION: hi marla, i am back to you again for some crochet help.i bought a great book when i was in winnipeg last august "crocheting for dummies", from which i have been teaching myself to crochet. it is a very good book, but for some reason i don't seem to find exactly how to count stitches and seem to rip more than i crochet. is the turning chain considered a stitch, because i am using it to increase one stitch in it's base and then i have to increase one at the end of the row and for some reason i have one more that i should. HOW DO YOU COUNT STITCHES?  please help as you were a big help in the past and i am enjoying the pattern which i hope to finish if i can figure out what i am doing wrong. thanking you so very much for your help. sincerely, thelma

ANSWER: Hi Thelma!
Welcome back. Do you mean the double crochet stitch? If you do, it sounds like you are having the same trouble I had when I first started to crochet. The first afghan I tried to make was in double crochet. It was lopsided and looked so awful I unraveled it and started over.
Anyway, back to your question. To save some time, I’ll just assume you are talking about double crochet.  In double crochet, the turning chain counts as the first double crochet stitch You do not double crochet in that first stitch (in the row you are starting on) that looks like you should (like in single crochet), because the turning chain is the first double crochet stitch of that row. So you skip that stitch and double crochet in the next stitch. Then at the end of the row, you double crochet in the turning chain stitch, which doesn’t really look like a stitch you that should crochet in because it is a chain stitch. And of course, that counts as a stitch, also.  By doing this, the number of stitches should remain the same, and the sides fairly even, not lopsided like my first afghan.
I hope I didn’t confuse you, and if this isn’t what you need to know, please let me know.  And by the way, anyone who knows how to knit is no dummy. I only know the basic knit stitch, and even then, my work looks like something my dog chewed on.
Good luck! Let me know how things are going.

Marla


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: hi again marla, many thanks as that answers my dc question, however, what happens with single crochet, half a double, triple and so on where there is a chain stitch at the beginning of a row. you are a great help. you should have helped write the "crochet book for dummies" which is my teacher. thelma

Answer
Hi Thelma!
Thanks for your nice thoughts. For single crochet, you crochet in the second stitch from the hook, which is the stitch it looks like you should, and then crochet to the last stitch that looks like you should crochet in it. Then you chain once and turn for the next row.  For half- double crochet, you chain 2 at the end, turn and crochet in the same stitch like you would for double crochet, and then crochet in the turning chain. In triple crochet you chain 4 at the end of the row, and like in double crochet, you skip that first stitch that looks like you should crochet in because the turning chain counts as the first triple crochet, then you triple crochet in the turning chain at the end.
I always try to count my stitches as I crochet along so that if somehow I miss a stitch or crochet twice in a stitch I know it in the end, so that I only have one row to correct. Too many times I have neglected to do this only to find out I have a lot of rows to unravel.
I hope this helps. Good luck with your project! Let me know if you need anything else.


Marla