Shortening from Foundation Chain
I have been making this beautiful ribbed car coat in time for fall and unfortunately, the directions have not given stitch counts for the length, but rather measurements in inches. Well, that became problematic as I am attempting to sew the body to the front yoke and they are not the same measurement across in the chest. (I must have pulled tighter in some areas than others when measuring) Thus, I need to shorten the length from the foundation end. My question is, how do I do start unraveling/ripping from the foundation end and make that end look neat? The entire project is made using a very simple single crochet worked through the back loop only. I have tried slip stitch, single crochet, reverse crochet, and a temper tantrum :( , but none have seemed to work - they just look...off.
Any help is greatly appreciated!
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if it were me, this is what i'd do...
I'd shorten all the pieces to a certain length, say 2 inches shorter than the pattern calls for, and then in either the same yarn or a happily contrasting yarn I'd add some sort of decorative edge or border or filet swear words or something. I just don't think I could get the bottom edge of the single shortened piece to look as nice as the others by fiddling with it, so I'd just shorten it all, add something different and act like I was all creative changing the pattern like that.
If you fiddle and try and swear and can't make the one edge look as nice, it's going to bug you every time you see it. So skip trying to do the thing that sucks and do something awesome...like filet swear words
Hardcore? Hardcore is for babies. I'm HOOKCORE!
ps
you don't have to (and probably) shouldn't listen to me, I'm on my second bowl of marshmallow mateys and I've consumed 3 metric butts of caffeine today.
Hardcore? Hardcore is for babies. I'm HOOKCORE!
Oh, tough situation. Crochet stitches only unravel easily from the top down.
As a mental experiment, I think you could snip the yarn at the edge as many rows up from the foundation as you want to remove. Then carefully unpick the stitches, one by one. Use a skinny knitting needle, or a yarn needle threaded with ribbon or mercerized cotton crochet thread, and use it to pick up the base of each stitch as soon as it's free. Just let the stitches collect on the needle until the whole row is unpicked.
Then, work some magic with chain stitch or sc or something to finish the bottoms of the stitches in the row. You'll have to decide what looks best.
I wouldn't try to unpick and then stitch each stitch. Do each process separately so it's very clear in your mind what you are doing.
Oh, make a swatch to practice on first. Practice the unpicking then practice the restitching. Then you'll be ready to try to fix your garment. Even if you've done the unpicking on your car coat already, I think you should practice restitching on a swatch. They're smaller, easier to throw across the room when the swearing starts.
I like bubbo's idea of trimming a row or two from both the fronts and the back so one hem won't look distinctly different from the others.
Very good luck to you. It's persnickety work.
I am having a tough time envisioning the problem and the project, but that might just be work getting in the way. However, I'm going to recommend this blog entry from Robyn. She kicks so much ass that I'm amazed she's as new as she claims to be to crochet. This is a correction for locating a buttonhole, but there's something in my gut that makes me think that it would work for shortening a project, when you need to shorten from the bottom. I must admit that I have not tried it, although, I trust in Robyn. You might even ask her if she has come across this. (Robyn is also known as CrochetbyFaye here.)
But I also believe in adding a trim. Trims help you forgive errors.