Expert: Marla - 8/20/2010

Question
QUESTION: As a child, my grandmother taught me a few simple stitches and helped
me make "blankets" for my baby dolls. Now that I am grown, I want to
share these kinds of experiences with my own daughter. I have bought a
book (A to Z of Crochet, The Ultimate Guide for the Befinner to Advanced)
and have read it from fron to back. I have practiced over and over each of
the basic stitches (single, double, etc) and have practiced many of the
other techniques. I have begun working on the other stitches in the book
so that I can know them once I begin working actual patterns. My question
is that as I am trying to work the Wavy Chevron, my rows do not seem to
come out even. I count each row and have the correct number of stitches
but the rows seem to get wider the farther up I work. The directions in the
book for the Wavy Chevron state the foundation chain needs to be a
multiple of 14 plus three (the three is for the turning chain). It also says
that I may need to adjust the number of turning chains in my foundation
chain. Does this mean I need to ADD turning chains on the foundation
chain? And if so, how many? Can you offer some advice or suggestions
to a similar pattern or website that will help me learn?
Thank you

ANSWER: Hi Allison!
Thanks for asking. Earlier this year I made my sister-in-law a ripple afghan, using just the single crochet.  I’m not sure what the instructions mean by adjusting the number of turning chains in the foundation chain unless it means that to make the afghan bigger you will need to have more chains to begin with.
I went to one craft store just down the road from me, but didn’t find the book. But this craft store is mainly for fabric, and doesn't have a lot of crochet books, so I'm not sure exactly what the afghan looks like. Is this afghan in double crochet?
I wonder if you are having the same trouble I had when I started to crochet. The ch 3 counts as the first dc. So if you were just using dc rows in an afghan, the very first stitch that you come to that looks like you should put a hook in, you skip, since that is considered the first stitch which is that ch 3 turning chain. Then at the end you dc in that last stitch, which is part of the turning chain. I hope that didn’t confuse you. When I first started to crochet, I dc in that stitch that you are supposed to skip, and did not dc in that last “turning chain” st and my afghan started getting lopsided. So I unraveled it and started over and did it the right way. Now there is always the possibility that there is a typo in the instructions. In ripple afghans, usually you either skip a stitch at the beginning or do a decrease, then do the same at the end.
If you could send me the instructions for the foundation row and the next row, or even the next row after that if it is different, I could look at it and see if there is a typo.
I searched for some websites. I googled “ripple crochet instructions” and came up with a “youtube” website that may be good. It is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZDhtp4-xyQ. My computer is slow with the video, and we have no audio so I can’t tell you if it is any good. There were a lot of other websites but this actually showed you how to do it. You may want to use this search and see what you think of the other websites. Please let me know so I will know if I can recommend it to others. Now, there are a lot of variations on the ripple, and this is just one of them.
Anyway, I’m sorry I got long winded. I hope I helped some. Keep me posted, and please let me know if you have any more questions.

Marla


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

QUESTION: I found the book at Books-A-Million (which is a small town version of a
Barnes & Noble). I will give you the directions so you can maybe work it
and figure out if I am having a problem with the directions or if I'm just not
paying attention to what I'm doing.

Wavy Chevron - This method works for all basic stitches, but you will need
to adjust the number of turning chains in your foundation chain.
1. Work the foundation chain, making sure it is a multiple of fourteen
stitches plus three.
2. Row 1. Skip three chains (the turning chain) and work two dc stitches
into the next chain.
3. Work a dc into each of the next three chains.
4. Over the next three chains, work three dc stitches together.
5. Repeat step 4.
6. Work a dc into each of the next three chains.
7. Work three dc into the next chain.
8. Repeat step 7.
9. Repeat steps 3 - 8 across the row, finishing with three dc stitches into
the last chain.
10. Work three turning chains and turn your work.
11. Row 2. Work two dc into the top of the first dc of the previous row.
12. Work a dc into each of the next three dc of the previous row.
13. Over the next the dc ofbtje previous row, work three dc together.
Repeat once.
14.  Work a dc into each of the next three dc of the previous row.
15.  Work three dc into the top of the next dc of the previous row. Repeat
once.
16. Repeat steps 12 - 15 across row, ending with three dc into the top
turning chain of previous row.
17. Work three turning chains and turn your work.
18. Work all subsequent rows in the same manner as row 2.  

Hope this helps.

ANSWER: Hi Allison!
I’m back I’ve done a few rows, and everything seems to look OK. The sides aren’t going to be square with the bottom like regular afghans. That is what may be confusing. If you lay the afghan flat, and place, say, a ruler or some other straight edge along the bottom of those curves, the sides should go straight up from the ruler. I hope I have made myself clear on this. You may have to quite a few rows to see this. Let me know if this may be the trouble. If the number of stitches is the same then it looks like you are doing everything correct. Hope to hear from you soon.

Marla


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

QUESTION: Thank you so much Marla!! I decided to go ahead and keep trying with the
Wavy Chevron / Ripple stitch. I used a smaller weight baby yarn to
attempt a baby doll blanket. I worked about 20 or so rows before stopping
to "inspect" what it looked like. It looks fine. It just has "bumps" along the
edges where the turning chain sticks out a little. I found the directions for
the shell edging and did that around the little blanket. It looks perfectly fine
with the edging! There are some spots where it's puckers up a little bit but
that's just where I worked the stithces too tight (a bad habit of my
perfectionist mind ).  My daughter loved it and urged me to follow another
pattern for a baby doll dress using the same yarn...it's a little lopsided and
a little too big for the baby doll but she loves it!  

Thank you Marla for spending the time to help me. I greatly appreciatte it!!
Allison

Answer
Hi Allison!
You are quite welcome. There are times when I have crocheted a few rounds or rows and it didn’t look right at first, but then it looked OK after crocheting several more. Sometimes my work puckers, too. Our tension can vary from day to day, depending on our mood or even if we are tired or not.   And yes, with double crochet or larger, the bumps on the sides of the afghan are pretty much unavoidable. I’m glad the afghan has gone well. Please feel free to contact me again if you need help.

Marla