Demystifying Double Crochet for Beginners
A couple of weekends ago I spent a few days in Portland, Oregon. There to see the west-coast premiere of Handmade Nation, the documentary about the indie craft movement, I ended up enjoying the best crafty weekend in the history of my life. After touring around some crafty hotspots around the city, eating fabulous meals with amazing people, seeing the film and talking long about it, we converged on the warmly welcoming home of Susan Beal to spend a few hours chilling out and making stuff.
Over the course of the afternoon, Sister Diane from Craftypod and I taught Rachel, AKA Average Jane Crafter, how to crochet. And Rachel asked the same questions every single beginner crocheter has ever asked me. See, we started Rachel off making a granny square, and after that proved a frustrating first project, I set her up simply making double crochets in rows. By the end of the afternoon, I was wondering something that hadn't occurred to me before: Why on earth do we start brand-new crocheters out with double crochet? When you're not yet familiar with what stitches look like and how to count them, why do we start them on a stitch that requires skipping at the beginning of a row, and working into a turning chain at the end? This, people, is a dumb thing we experienced crocheters do. We should stop.
But until we do, I hope these tips will help out new crocheters who are struggling despite assurances that crochet is easy as pie. Sometimes pie can be a great confounding mystery. Let's set you on a path to evening those edges out, ok? (Note: You can click on any photo for an option to see a larger size.)
Image 1: Here's what it looks like as you approach the end of a row of double crochet. I've circled the tops of the stitches from the previous row that remain to be worked. The most common confusion is where to place the last couple of stitches; it's very, very common for beginners not to work a stitch in the top of the turning chain from the previous row. So in the circle are the final double crochet (rightmost in the circle) and, to the left of it at the end, the top of the turning chain.
Image 2: The arrow is keeping track of the turning chain, and I'm inserting my hook into the next double crochet.
Image 3: I've pulled up a loop in the double crochet. The arrow is still indicating the top of the turning chain.
Image 4: I've finished the stitch and the arrow is on pointing to the top of the turning chain. See how easy it would be to skip it? After all, it sort of looks like the edge could straighten out after a little tugging. Alas, though, it won't.
Image 5: Ok, no more arrow. Here I'm about to insert my hook in the top of the turning chain. By "top of the turning chain," I mean the topmost of the three chains. Notice how I'm using the fingers of my other hand to open that sucker up. It can be tight and/or awkward to shove your hook in there, but persistence will pay off.
Image 6: I've pulled up a loop in the top of the turning chain. It's pretty apparent now that we need to work a stitch here to make the edge straight, eh?
Image 7: Here's the completed final stitch of the row. There's nothing to the left of it to stick my hook in, so I'm confident it really is the end of the row.
Image 8: Now we say to "turn your work." This means to flip it around so your hook is poised to start the next row (in these photos I'm working right-handed, so at the beginning of a row my hook is on the right. If you're a lefty and you crochet left-handed [hey, not all lefties do!], your hook is on the left at the beginning of a row).
Image 9: Make 3 chains. This is the "turning chain" which serves the function of raising the hook to the height of the stitches you'll be making. Since double crochet is a fairly tall stitch, most patterns say to "count the turning chain as the first stitch of the row." This is because that turning chain takes up about as much space as a double crochet. Since we're counting it as the first stitch, we work the first actual double crochet into the second stitch of the row, not the first. (If we work it into the first stitch, the edge will bulge out and look wonky.) The arrow is keeping track of that first stitch that we're going to skip before making the first double crochet.
Image 10: This might be a confusing photo. If it is, ignore it. I'm inserting my hook in the second stitch, and the arrow is pointing to the skipped first stitch.
Image 11: Ok, this is better. Here I've pulled up a loop for the double crochet, and the arrow is pointing to the first stitch which I didn't insert my hook into. At the very right, you can pick out the chains of the turning chain; see how they're pretty much rising from that first stitch? That's why we skip it before working the first double crochet.
Image 12: I've completed the double crochet and the arrow is still indicating the first stitch from the previous round row. So even though I've only worked one double crochet, you can see it looks like we actually have two stitches made. This is why we count the turning chain as a full-on stitch.
It's entirely possible that my familiarity with crochet has prevented me from really getting to the heart of any confusion you might have. Please leave a comment with any questions I haven't answered—or that, eep, I've introduced—and I or someone in the community will chime in to help you out.
Promise me something, though. In a few months when a friend begs you to teach them how to crochet, start with single crochet, eh? The last stitch of the row can still be tough to place, but at least you won't have to contend with the turning-chain-counts-as-a-stitch thing.
- Kim Werker's blog
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About Kim Werker
About Me:
I'm the founder of CrochetMe.com and the author of Crochet Me and five other books. I love sushi, thunderstorms, good books, the smell of clean laundry, and I also blog at kimwerker.com. You can follow my daily moves on Twitter and Tumblr.
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Excellent post that I just forwarded to a friend at work who is having some trouble starting.
Also, why do we say easy as pie? Pie was effing hard for me in the beginning.
Great post - I had the problem of the amazing self-tapering project with a shawl I was making using double-crochet. I finally figured it out myself, but not until I had to frog the majority of it and start over again... Here's to saving others from this same mistake!
Great tutorial. I always forget this between long periods of not crocheting and its too late by the time I remember. I tell myself just to be constant and then to crochet a border! =P
Crocheting a border can work magic! I almost always crochet one around double-crochet projects, because I think even dc edges done "right" still don't look very neat.
www.kimwerker.com
So if one were to add an edge, could one choose to sc around? If so, how many sc would one insert into each dc side?
Sure! You can work a border in any stitch, and there are tons and tons of more complex edging patterns you could use too. A general way to approach working a single-crochet border around a double-crochet project:
Work 1 sc in each dc stitch, work 3 sc in each corner so the corners don't curl in, work between 1-2 sc in each row-end. The row-ends are the tricky part because each dc or turning chain is wider than a single sc will fill. But sometimes working 2 sc in each row-end is too many and the edge will ruffle. This isn't an exact science, so trust your instinct. If your work ruffles, you need to work fewer stitches; if it curls in you need to work more.
www.kimwerker.com
Great tutorial! It took me several tries and a lot of frustration to figure out how to make rows of dc look good when I started crocheting. Here's hoping your shared wisdom saves someone else the same grief! :)
Nice photo tutorial, Kim. Sometimes I instruct beginning crocheters to use a stitch marker, or scrap of yarn, to mark the top chain of the turning chain so they don't have trouble finding it on the next row.
Talk about an A-HA! moment…I've been crocheting less than six months and have only one Beanie class under my belt. Working in rows has been vexing and I though I had figured it out. This tutorial confirms my suspicions. THANK YOU! I can now proceed with confidence (albeit with caution).
Caution is unnecessary! What will happen if you make a mistake? Nothing. You'll learn, rip it out, and move on. Caution is for construction sites and crossing fast-moving rivers. For crochet, just do it.
www.kimwerker.com
This is fantastic! If only someone had shown me this back when I was first learning to crochet when I was a kid. This is exactly what I've learned in my years of practicing and getting it wrong versus easier patterns where I was forced to count and got it right.
I will certainly save this to share with all friends trying so hard to get it right.
Thank you!
Hi! I have taught zillions of school kids how to crochet and always had them crochet "miles and miles" of chains. When they could make the chains all the same size - we then "zipped" and rerolled before starting singles, doubles always came a few classes later. Maybe this helps some.
So I'm one of those crazy people who just randomly decided to teach herself how to knit and crochet. This is the best explanation and sheds some much needed light on it! Few videos were helpful and often not close enough to show the detail needed to understand correctly. Your pictures are clear and your direct easy to duplicate. Thank you - so much!
i love you! i've been seriously crocheting for about a year now, trying to teach myself new techniques and branch out from the "look, a scarf!" and "look, a hat!" that i'm good at, and you are the. first. person. i've found who instructs three chains at the end of a row. which makes crochet so much prettier. : ) your photos and clear directions were so very helpful - so thank you!
These are the MOST amazing pictures !!! Congratulations on a wonderful job
This is an awesome Fail and Win picture. Right up my geeky crochet alley;)Great post!
I TOTALLY AGREE with the above comments. I can't tell you how many times I've been baffeled by my wavy edged scarves!!!
I was taught with a half double as my first stich.
Rows and rows of them. I have whole afgans made with only HDC's! I was very impressed with myself until I thought I would just bang out a few scarves as quick gifts for my friends.
How frustrating to see that wavy edge. I wanted to give up crocheting! I felt almost like a traitor when I secretly consulted the crafting beginner books in the library.
It's such a relief when the correct way to end a row and begin the next finally dawns on you! It was for me anyway.
Your pictures and direction will be very helpful, a beginner's lifesaver, really!
Thanks so much.
Do you always count the chain 3 as the first stitch? In sc I always go into the side of the work and then miss a stitch when I start a new row. If I dont, then I seem to increase stitches where I shouldn't have increases.
There are always exceptions, but the norm is that, yes, for double crochet you count the chain-3 as the first stitch. It takes up a lot more room than the ch-1 used for single crochet.
www.kimwerker.com
Thank you Kim. Have you seen the new way how to make a dc without having the hole at the end of your row? It's on youtube and it's ingenius how she does it.
Kim
I have a question for you. In the magazine Interweave, is it possible to put in the back or on the pattern, substitions for material that used? I can't always find what is used and a different material that could be used for that particular pattern, would be very helpful.
Thanks so much
I no longer work at the magazine, but they do include information about the yarn weight and fiber content in each pattern. You can contact them at interweavecrochet.com.
www.kimwerker.com
They do? I've only seen mostly cotton used for their patterns and like I said before, I can't always find the product that they use.
Thanks for getting back to me and keep on making those tutorials.
Your pictures and instructions were amazingly useful and easy to understand. However, I went through them step by step, and it seems I am still having a problem with it gradually tapering--not nearly as obvious as the initial picture, but I counted the number of stitches I had in my first double row, and then the number of stitches in my current row, and it seems the number of stitches in each row is increasing. Is this supposed to happen?
Or Am I supposed to alternate rows where I use the chain to turn around?
Yes, you should always use the chain, and you should always be careful to skip working into the first stitch of the row, since the chain counts as the first stitch of your new row. It's possible that's where your extra stitch is coming from.
www.kimwerker.com
Thanks so much for the clear instructions. I could not find an answer to this problem anywhere on the net. I just wanted to know WHERE to put my hook in the turning chain and end of row. Thanks,
newbiecrocheter
I have been crocheting for 5 years and was self-taught. All the books and things I've gotten off the web or from the library were NEVER THIS precise. I have tried a zillion different ways to stitch into the top of a turning chain and then afterward, trying to figure out if the 1st stitch I am supposed to skip or crochet into is either a part of the turning chain or an actual space! I see why so many of my projects turned out wrong or off. I would experience things getting smaller, and the bulky edge. I didn't even know that that space you showed as the last space to place a stitch before the turning chain - wasn't a part of the turning chain as well!
I have been so frustrated about this. Even asking friends for help, but they never follow through. I even got a few friends asking me to help teach them, so imagine my embarrassment when I couldn't show them what people think are such elementary steps.
I began a huge project on a strawberry shortcake blanket for my DD and I couldn't do it because of these simple mistakes. I counted and recounted each little stitch until I couldn't keep track of them any more. I pulled and redid so many times that I gave up. And now she's grown out of the strawberry shortcake phase.
I was sitting here making my closest sister a blanket for her firstborn baby boy's baby shower and I just figured that as long as I was consistent, I could make it look like I did it on purpose. But I Googled "where is top of turning chain" and searching images I came across your post. I wanted to jump for joy and laugh - or cry - at how thorough you are in this. I will have to take apart what I've done but that's okay.
It may seem dumb to some, but to others - we learn better when each step is explained completely. When learning how to crochet or knit, I did each stitch over and over again for days on end before I moved on to the next stitch. So it wasn't from lack of practice that I came to spend this many years going this route.
I am also a busy mom with young children and I don't have much time to myself so now I can feel like I can sit down and make something AND actually complete it in a sane amount of time. Now I can finally make things for others and myself feeling confident that I am doing it right and it's going to turn out well, not languishing back in my drawer as just another pretty ball of yarn.
THANK YOU!!!
Oh, my. You're very, very welcome! I hope you find much peace and joy in your crochet. :)
www.kimwerker.com
I could HUG you, I am so estatic. I feel like my joy and enthusiasm for crocheting has come back. You've taken something and given validation to the frustration so many feel, and then you went to explain how to do it - you are wonderful!