It’s a stuff day.

I had gotten in the habit of blasting this site and social media every Sunday and Monday with a pattern or two and

some posts, but the last couple of days I’ve been doing……stuff.
One of the stuffs I’ve been doing is conquering my block regarding lace. As a regular crocheter, I love lace. As a knitter and Tunisian crocheter, I run and hide behind the couch where lace is concerned. I would make half-hearted attempts to start, get frustrated, pick my short little hooks up, and just crochet the thing blindfolded while hopping up and down on one foot.

Except that’s not always good. I’ve been watching these videos lately, some of them made by a very good friend of mine and all these motivational coaches love to talk about pushing your boundaries and testing your limits.

OK.

So I tested mine. Success!!

Day One was a day of tears and frustration and I was in a house without chocolate. I picked my copy of The New Tunisian Crochet (non-affiliate link) off my bookshelf and committed to doing this thing. I’d actually started the Lace Wave a few times before and couldn’t get past a certain point and each time couldn’t remember why, until I got started again. Then there were tears and gnashing of teeth and out came the stubby little Boye hooks and yet another Celtic Wave was crocheted in its place.

BUT THIS TIME I was better at this stuff. And THIS TIME I figured out what I was doing wrong. It only took most of the day, and it involved a batch of salted oatmeal cookies that magically appeared in the oven and were never seen again, but it happened.

I CAN MAKE TUNISIAN CROCHET LACE!!!!

I turned that pattern into my bitch.

That’s right, Lace Wave. I own you. You may kneel.

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…….onto CALs.

A CAL, for those of you scratching your heads, is a “Crochet Along”. It’s a planned event where someone uses a pattern, gets a group together, and then they crochet daily, weekly, or monthly, a different part of a pattern until it’s all finished. Participants usually meet informally in a group – like a Ravelry or Facebook group – to post their progress, ask questions of the organizers or other members, chit chat, and just be social. When they finish, participants post photos of their finished work in a display area meant for that CAL, like a Pinterest board or link to a Ravelry project page.

It has been put to me a few times over the last few months, that I should do a CAL. This has been percolating in my head for a while, and it was one of the stuffs that I decided to get started on this weekend. So far I’ve come to the conclusion that organizing a CAL is a lot like trying to seat people at a wedding and I have no experience at that, either.

So, dear TC fans, what do YOU want a CAL for? An afghan made of different squares? The infinity scarf that I’m making right now whose progress pictures I’m boring you with – you know, because lace? An entrelac something? A mandala? Leave a comment on the Facebook page and let me know.

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Speaking of that lovely lace infinity scarf…..

A lot of you really, really like it!! Thank you!!! I have picked up several IG followers in the 24 hours since I started posting #wip photos. That’s great!! Thanks for stopping by and sticking around. Some of you in various places have requested a tutorial.

It’ll happen, just not today.

When I finish this one, which will be soon, I will do a tutorial. Once I realized my mistake, it was actually pretty easy and now I’m sailing through. I found myself looking for information on left and right slanted TC decreases this evening so I can do MORE lace and start charting my own patterns.

PS: I really, really love Instagram. Really love it. If you have an IG account, follow me!! @tunisiancrochetchick 

This is chemo cap #1 in what I’m hoping will be a three part series of free patterns. A short time ago, my friend Tammy received a diagnosis that rocked her world. She has had surgery right away and now chemo begins. I’m up here in Canada and while I know she’s a new friend to me, and  has a loving community in Texas that won’t let her fall, I still feel like I should do something. I think we all feel like that when someone we know becomes seriously ill.

This was the first beanie that I made for her. It is sized a little bit larger than I normally make my hats. I like my beanies to be a bit snug around my head. This one is meant to slip on and off with no give so as not to irritate skin. Bald heads can be sensitive.

Pattern Notes

This pattern is made using the Short Row Circle tutorial that I shared with readers over at My Hobby Is Crochet. The short row circle is the crown (top) of the hat. The sides are worked entrelac-style, by attaching yarn to a stitch along the edge of the short row circle, making a foundation chain, and picking up loops in it. After the last loop is picked up, an extra loop is picked up in the side edge of the circle, to join. A standard return row is then worked. Subsequent rows are worked in Tss, joining at the side edge of the crown. The last row is bound off and the hat is turned inside out. The beginning row and ending row are slip stitched together, the ends are woven in, and voila!! A bucket beanie!! …..so named because it looks like a little bucket.

Supplies:

8.0mm Tunisian hook

1 skein Red Heart Super Saver, Aran Fleck

darning needle

Gauge: 

Crown: 4 stitches/1 inch

Cuff: 3 stitches/1 inch

Crown:

Follow the instructions at My Hobby Is Crochet, to create a short row circle with a starting chain of 10 stitches. Work in Tss and create six wedges. This will give you 60 stitches along the side edges of the crown.

Cuff: 

Attach yarn to one side stitch at crown edge. Chain 20. Work a standard foundation row (pick up 20 loops in the foundation chain). Pick up a loop in the side stitch of the crown where you attached the yarn. 21 loops on the hook. Work return pass as follows:

*YO, pull through 2 loops*, across, until 1 loop is left on the hook. Working this return keeps the stitch count of your cuff at 20.

Work remaining rows in Tss on 20 stitches, all the way around, joining in side stitches of crown. Bind off last row. Turn hat inside out and hold two edges so wrong sides are facing outwards. Use hook to slip stitch the side seam closed. Use darning needle to weave in ends.

These are the same instructions given in the photo tutorial for the Entrelac C2C blanket. If you are confused, look at the pictures captioned “Begin the second row”. You are joining yarn to the side edge of the crown and working joined rows in the same manner. The difference is, you are going all the way around a hat crown and working 58 rows before binding off.

This produces a cuff on the hat that can be folded back, watch cap style. The backside of Tss when worked sideways, looks like ribbing. For something shorter, chain 15 instead of 20.

Copyright 2015 Nicole Cormier. 

You can make and sell items using my patterns but you may not sell the patterns. The patterns are free and traffic helps keep this site going, so please credit and link back to my patterns, do not post the pattern. 

Being in a creative profession can be tough. We put ourselves into our work daily, and when people love it, well, we get a little high on that, don’t we? Not everyone is a fan, though. No matter how long you’ve been at it, or how strong you believe yourself to be, sometimes the criticisms of others can really sting. We can hold our heads up and pretend that we aren’t bothered, but that empty ice cream container tells no lies.

None of us can control how someone else treats us, but we can always control how we respond to that treatment. This is not a definitive guide to dealing with negative people, just some helpful suggestions.

Deal with it now. Not later, NOW.

Many times people are completely unaware that what they have said is hurtful. This is especially true of the Internet. Rotting and stewing don’t make things better. If something that someone has said really, truly bothers you then you need to address it right away. Letting it go only opens the door for more of the same because your inaction is showing people how you will allow yourself to be treated. There is much to be said for the merits of a civilized conversation, so take a few deep breaths, centre yourself, and ask them what they meant.

Don’t overlook the power of a good laugh, either. I find this is especially important when dealing with keyboard critics who feel brave behind their monitors. It’s easy to be hateful toward someone when you don’t have to confront them directly. If you want to watch something really funny, check out these celebrities responding to mean tweets on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

It’s not you. Really, it isn’t.

You can’t please everyone all the time. Being all things to all people is impossible and eventually there will be someone who just plain hates your work even though you may be the nicest, most talented artisan on the planet with the best cookies at their craft table. Or maybe they just plain don’t like your personality. No amount of bending over backwards and swaying like the reed in the wind is going to change their minds. It happens. I’m sure there are people out there that you don’t like and you don’t know exactly why you don’t like them, and any reasons you could think of probably sound really silly when you say them out loud. Likewise, you don’t like the work of every artisan when you come across it.

Sometimes our creative work triggers people in ways we never considered. Certain textures, colours, patterns, or shapes can trigger memories or emotional responses – but this is what art does. It provokes. Although I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anyone get emotional over my dishrag or sock patterns, I have displayed some artsier pieces of crochet that have provoked discussion. I consider those responses to my work to be just as valid, and perhaps more important than the kindly praise.

Living well is the best revenge

An eye for an eye only works in mythology and epic movies. Revenge, making sure that everyone knows “the truth” about something, or circulating gossip about your detractors only makes you as bad as them. Like stewing in your own juices when someone walks all over you, revenge is a way of telling the universe that you’d like continued heaping helpings of more of the same. When you start thinking in vengeful ways, you fall out of grace and you give power to those who want to see you fall. By giving toxic people power, you fall of your path and onto someone else’s.

So resist the urge to make passive aggressive Facebook statuses or to post snide Instagram memes. Go to the gym and work that sh*t off until you’re too tired to care. Repeat as often as necessary. Your ass will look great, your stress levels will be better for it, and really, most drama has a shelf life of about two weeks and then everyone moves on to something else.

Forgive and move on

Forgiveness does not mean forgetting, but it does mean putting something down and walking away from it. Many of us will cling to things that upset us because we expect closure. We sit back like pouty queens, waiting those who have upset us to come forward with apologies. 99.9% of the time it ain’t gonna happen. Either the guilty party is blithely unaware that they have done anything to offend you, or quite bluntly, they don’t care. Or maybe they do care, but they enjoy being attached to drama.

You should totally stop analyzing why you aren’t getting closure or getting the closure that you want. It will make you a bitter harpy in record time and you don’t want that. Put that sh*t down and walk away.

Life is only as complicated as you want to make it, so why spend your time trying to figure out someone else’s penchant for crapulence? Forgiving someone does not mean that you are saying it is ok for that b-ho in the crochet group to make smart remarks about your abilities as a designer or to continue treating you like a third class citizen on Tumblr. It does not mean that they won or that you won or that anybody lost. These are mindsets that you have to let go of. It is about you giving yourself permission to slough their words or actions off and to take back your happiness.

There is no such thing as bad publicity

Yup, you were just called an amateur. Your prices were publicly dissed or maybe you encountered something like I did recently: “You aren’t a designer. Calvin Klein is a designer. You just take old patterns, change a few things, and call it yours.” <– I don’t know where she got that from, especially since the person in question was referencing a baby blanket in an Eastern European craft magazine from the 1970s. Not only do I avoid making baby things as much as humanly possible, but I don’t speak Polish. Or Slovakian. Or whatever it was that she was talking about. Eh???? Clearly she needed to vent at someone and I was convenient.

But, I’m babbling.

Negative publicity can generate just as much traffic – sometimes more. If possible, own it and rock it. Try to turn it into something that can work for you. Resist the urge to hide and don’t go making “I’m taking a break posts” anywhere. You’re fine and this too shall pass. The best part is when people come to your site or store expecting hoo-haw and instead they get this really put together human being who’s just so darned nice and talented.

Meditate

There is something to be said for moments of quiet reflection. Most of us give great advice to our friends and creative peers, and we could do with a little of taking our own medicine sometimes. Think about your situation as if this was someone across your table telling you this story. What would you say to them? We spend a lot of our day propping up other people and we often forget to be this kind to ourselves.

Meditation can be a way of opening up to change in all its forms and understanding that sometimes the worst sh*tstorms can be the most liberating events ever.

All links in this post are non-affiliated. I receive no compensation – I just really like what this guy has to say!! I’ve reworked this article over the last year or so depending on the industry I was writing for. I wear a few hats, so some of you might read this and think “Hmmmm….sounds familiar”. This post will be its permanent home as I have started to put all of my energy into my fibre artwork.
 

This post was inspired by a great little free ebook by Owen, over at Marketing Tools For Artists. When I read what he had to say I got excited because I’ve been trying to figure out how to say this, and his words gave me a jumping point. Even though this ebook may not be geared towards your industry, it’s worth a read, anyway. 

I love what I do!! I heart crochet in a big huge way, since the dawn of time.  Even when I have veered off into other fields, I have always brought my love of crafting with me. My salon clients look for the yarn and hooks tucked behind my manicure table or sticking out of my bag. My other love is divination, more specifically, numerology and runes, so from time to time articles I have written show up in my Twitter feed, confusing the hell out of other hookers. I use the principles of sacred geometry and runes in my mandalas and other crochet creations. I love to travel and being self-employed is important in that regard because if I worked for someone else I might not have the freedom to see the world. I love that I can be my creative artsy-fartsy self all the live long day and not get held to the same standard of boring that others are. I love that not stuck in an office processing documents because although that may be heavenly to some, it’s medieval torture to me. I love that my income potential is unlimited, I love that I’m in an environment hand-tailored for left brained freaky people such as myself, an environment that allows me to succeed in a predominantly right-brained culture – because all you logical people that think you rule the world, you need people like me to show you a different world view of the bumps in the road – boy howdy, you do.

“Just” a crafter. Heh.

BUT

Big but…..

A lot of us don’t stay at this very long. In fact, I can guarantee that most of the craft bloggers I read ten years ago aren’t doing this right now. This makes me sad – it really, really does – I know people say that all the time “That makes me sad”, but I’m telling you the truth. I know that not all of us will be raving successes in our fields of choice, but surely more of us could be doing better. Because I genuinely hate to see people throw away a perfectly good opportunity, I have thought long and hard about why this could be. I have come up with a list of what I believe are behaviours that need to change among artsy-fartsy folks in many fields:

1. Not sticking to a specific method and/or getting to know a system really well. Hand in hand with this is not taking the time to master a technique. If you mix things up and consistently produce poor work then stop doing that!! I’ve ranted about this before, but if you’re going to invest in learning a skill, then take the time out to get to know what you are using. Don’t start filling gaps with other tools. Some techniques are better than others for certain types of work but you won’t know this if you keep flitting around. This means that some things just won’t work together no matter how much you try to force them. If you constantly go hopping around, looking for the next shiny hook or paintbrush to make your work “easier”, you will deny yourself the opportunity to really grow and develop your skill set. Explore something to its fullest and exploit the hell out of it before you decide to throw your yarn/hooks/needles/looms into the Closet of Shame.
2. Not developing a solid routine. Creative chaos is a beautiful thing that brings a tear to my eye, but underneath that spread out mess of yarn, glitter, glue, random papers with inspired writing scribbled on them has to be an underlying process to keep you organized and on track. Your creative process will go to hell quickly and not manifest in brilliance without a plan. This is true of anything that you do, whether it is Tarot readings, weaving, knitting, or even drywalling. Half-assery helps no one.
3. Trying to please everyone. Creative fields attract a lot of heart-centred people pleasers that end up getting burned out and bitter quickly. You can’t please everyone and sooner or later you will learn that lesson. Don’t take it personally when it happens, although you probably will. I’ll be here for hugs when you need them and a kind push back into the frying pan. Spend some quality time really thinking about who your ideal client is and then work your ass off to attract that client. Do your best for everyone, but be selective when building your client base. You don’t have to take everyone and do everything.
4. Not paying enough attention to the business end of things. In your first year or two of your fabulously cool creative endeavours take every fun artsy-fartsy seminar. Go to craft expos to watch well known artisans and other crafty folks do fabulous things. Knock yourself out. At some point you will figure out that the foofoo classes are all the same, regardless of the focus of your study. You don’t need to watch every designer cast on every stitch. You don’t need to see a hundred different demonstrations on techniques that you already know how to do. Develop your own style and start setting aside your professional development budget for seminars and classes on things like: marketing, payroll, labour laws, understanding client behaviour, blogging/social media, business planning – things that will enhance your career education and make your foundation that much more solid. There’s no point in designing the best! baby booties! ever!  if you don’t know how to promote yourself. If you build it, they won’t come if they don’t know.
5. Not charging properly. Get over your hangups NOW about making money. This one really sticks in my craw because I get really tired of seeing people complain about not making money, but then not charging what they’re worth. Stop being emotional about your client’s money. If s/he wants your work, they can afford you. If they really can’t – NEXT!! Bid them good day graciously, and carry on, ever forward.
6. For the love of all that is glittery and sacred – and I’m squinting right at you sweet, sweet crafting folk – stop taking things out in trade for crap that doesn’t benefit you. You will start to feel very, very resentful after a while, “OMG here comes Susan AHHHGAIN. I bet she wants a scarf and I bet she’s going to offer to pay me in f*cking  scrapbooking crap AHHHGAIN.” You are every bit as entitled as anyone else in this world to receive useful payment for services rendered. Sometimes it’s nice to take things out in trade but if you don’t draw clear boundaries around this you’ll end up with a closet full of soap and candles, and no rent money in the cookie jar.
7. Having unrealistic expectations about their path to success. Having creative talent is only a small part of this. I will say this until I am blue in the face: the most successful of us are NOT the most talented. The most successful professionals in any field are the ones who can hustle and get their names out there and keep them out there. Quite often, their work is no better than anyone else’s, and in some cases it’s full of little mistakes once you start looking closely. The difference between those of us who become well known and those of us who don’t is that whether they are conscious of it or not, industry celebrities use exposure as a tool to keep moving forward, not as a means to an end. Blogs, magazine interviews, YouTube channels, Instagram pages – these are all tools and the more you acquire, the harder you have to work to stay relevant. It’s also important to bear in mind that exposure exposes you – all of you – it opens your work and life up to praise and criticism.
8. Before you hit the road to embark on your (hopefully) successful career path, give some thought to what being successful actually means to you. Is it peer recognition? Awards? Having a huge client base? Being able to go to Mexico every year? Owning a home? Getting a column in a magazine? Being on a TV show? I never thought of myself as successful until someone in the industry told me that they thought I was, a few years ago. As soon as I started to shift my perception of what success was, to something that actually suited me, things changed and suddenly the universe became a far less threatening place.
9. Not taking time to understand client needs. If you’re like most of us in artistic fields, you take in-person clients for commission work and that constitutes the bulk of your income. It’s a good idea to put the bulk of your energy into the place that pays you the most. For most of us, the clients pay our bills, not the strangers clicking the hearts on Instagram – unless your business involves digital information also. Communication is a big part of understanding client needs. It’s also a big part of them understanding you and your process. Most people are not artists or artisans and they don’t mean to be offensive in their ignorance. They don’t get how long it takes to make something or how much it costs. They just see the end result. This will be an ongoing thing for you as a creative professional. When you encounter a patron that understands your medium and appreciates it in a way that benefits you financially – celebrate this person, and then learn how to attract more of them. The next time you’re engaging in small talk, ask your clients/patrons specifically what they look for when they buy items in your field. Then listen without judgement. They may not be the client you end up wanting right now, but you may be able to point them in the right direction. It’s all a big circle and what goes around comes back.
10. Not having a plan. For years I winged it and for years I was frustrated and it sucked to be me. Business plans are not just for people who want to open a business. They are for employees too. They are for file clerks, receptionists, hairstyling assistants, actors, teachers, Tarot readers, estheticians, sculptors, Reiki Masters, and ditch diggers, too. They can be as complex or as simple as you want to make them. What a business plan does is allows you to plan out your future in nice little bites that don’t seem quite so intimidating once you map it all out. An ideal starting point for those of us in this industry is the Right Brained Business Plan, by Jennifer Lee. This book makes business planning fun and sparkly, for those of us who are more about flinging glitter than we are about charts and columns. A good business plan sets out a yearly goal (for example: enough craft sales to pay the bills) and then quarterly goals for that year (for example: perfecting one type of technique every quarter), followed by monthly goals (for example: write an email newsletter to your clients every month, or film a relevant YouTube video) and then weekly goals (for example: order supplies every Monday, sit down and update client data files with info that may have been missed, call back the ones who haven’t seen you in a while, see if they still like their sweater – maybe it fell apart in the wash – you never know.), and daily goals (for example: dust your studio before working or receiving patrons, straighten up the photographs and paintings on the walls, capture some data on every client that comes to see you, if you have social media then spend 20 minutes every day engaging with your followers). These are all things that will work together to get you to being busy and if you create a plan and follow it daily, you will see success.

If you look through a lot of my patterns on Ravelry, you will see that I like to use the honeycomb stitch. When you combine offset rows of Tss and Tps, the resulting pattern looks like the cells in a honeycomb. It’s easy to do and I love the way it looks. Here are some other reasons why I love this stitch pattern:

• It helps to control the curl of the fabric. Most of the time, I try to use the curl in my patterns to my advantage but sometimes I just want the work to lie flat without a lot of blocking.
• In a slightly larger than normal gauge, it has great drape. Worsted weight yarn with a 6.0mm hook produces a fabric that isn’t stiff, but still has enough body for things like gloves or dishcloths. Worsted weight yarn with an 8.0mm hook has a gorgeous drape for scarves and blankets that work up quickly.
• The patterning helps to soften line transitions. A good many of us in crochet are addicted to self-striping yarns because they offer some gorgeous, luminous colour transitions that are all conveniently in one skein. Not all striped yarns are created equally, though. Some have rather harsh colour transitions and I don’t like that. If I am working with such a yarn, this stitch pattern is ideal for breaking up that crisp division.
• In yarns like Red Heart’s Unforgettable or Noro’s Kureyon, where the transitions are already fabulous, the softening effect takes a great self-striping yarn and turns the transitions into something that reminds me of wet in wet watercolour. I get a great big happy just thinking about it.
• It gives me something to focus on. Row after row of one stitch gets a little monotonous. Offset stitch patterns, where the rows are staggered like bricks, require a little more mindfulness.

The pattern:

Even number of stitches.

If you do not know how to do Tss or Tps, follow the links back to their tutorials.

Row 1: Tps, *Tss, Tps* rep across to last stitch, Tss in last stitch.

Row 2: *Tss, Tps* rep across to last stitch, Tss in last stitch.

Here is a short Instagram video, showing what it looks like when you do it:

A short clip showing the Tss/Tps motion in the honeycomb stitch. #crochet365days #crochetofinstagram #crochetaddict #crochetisbetter #tunisiancrochet #tunisianentrelac

A video posted by Nicole Cormier (@tunisiancrochetchick) on Feb 1, 2016 at 12:02pm PST

The Tunisian purl stitch  (Tps) is the subject of some discussion, owing to the fact that it is called such simply because it looks like a knitted purl; not because it is any particular stitch in reverse.

However, I’ve ranted about this a little already.

When you work this stitch, the yarn is held to the front. The hook is inserted from left to right (for the lefties) or right to left (for the righties) behind the vertical bar formed in the stitch in the row below. The yarn is wrapped around the hook and pulled back through. The resulting loop is left on the hook and the next stitch is worked, and so on. The return pass is the same as for Tss.

Here is an Instagram video, showing the stitch in motion. Below that are photos showing step by step:

Shorty short short demonstration of the Tunisian Purl Stitch #crochet #tunisiancrochet #crochet365days #crochetofinstagram #ravelryaddict #yarn #crochetaddict

A video posted by Nicole Cormier (@tunisiancrochetchick) on Feb 1, 2016 at 10:34am PST

Make a chain of any number and pick up loops in the usual way.

Work a standard return pass.

Bring the yarn to the front of the work, insert the hook behind the vertical bar, yo, and pull back through.

A row of Tps.

Five rows of Tps. It looks a little bit like a knitted purl.

This was done at the request of some of the followers where I have been guest blogging. I apologize, because really, my site isn’t all that beginner friendly.

Tunisian Simple Stitch (TSS or Tss) is the most basic stitch in Tunisian crochet. It is done by keeping the yarn to the back of the work, and passing the hook from left to right (for lefties) or from right to left (for righties) behind the vertical bar of yarn. That vertical bar is actually the front thread of the stitch. After the hook is passed through the stitch, the yarn is wrapped around the hook and drawn back through. The result is a loop on the hook and when the row of live stitches (loops on the hook) are closed off in the return pass, the stitch looks like an upright vertical bar.

In these photographs, an 8mm hook and worsted weight acrylic are used, specifically, Red Heart Aran Fleck. It is my favourite yarn for tutorials because I find that it photographs well.

Video links:

The following videos are very, very short. They were intended for Instagram but I didn’t realize that I couldn’t import an external video – I have to use the app and it is almost painful to shoot a video of your own hands with a smart phone. Therefore, these videos have no voice or cool foo foo – because I was counting on being able to make them all fancy in Instagram. Sorry!!!

Starting chain

Tunisian standard foundation row

Tunisian standard return pass

Tunisian simple stitch

Tunisian bind off in Tss

Tunisian purl stitch  For those who feel like checking this out. It’s not in this photo tutorial but I made a video for it anyway.

Make a foundation chain. The numbers of chains will be equal to the number of loops you pick up onto your hook. So, if you want 10 stitches, chain 10.

The tops of a crochet stitch looks like a heart. Put your hook through the “heart” and yarn over your hook as in the picture. Pull through the chain stitch and draw up a loop.

I chained 10, so 10 loops are on the hook. To work the return pass, first yarn over the hook and draw through one loop. I’ve done this already in the photo. By doing this, you create the side edge of your work.

The rest of the stitches are worked off the hook by wrapping the yarn over the hook and drawing through two loops. In the photograph I’ve done this and I’m just holding it flat to show you what that looks like after it’s been done. Continue like this all the way across until there is one loop left on the hook.

Voila!! Your foundation row of Tunisian crochet is complete!! If you look carefully, you will see vertical bars. There are 10 of them. The first and last bars are the side edges of your work (selvedges). The working loop on the hook corresponds to the very first vertical bar, so it is not worked. Many patterns assume that you know this, so when they give row instructions, the first stitch (or sometimes “next stitch”) that they refer to being worked is actually the second vertical bar.

To work a Tunisian simple stitch (Tss), insert your hook behind this vertical bar from left to right for the lefties or right to left for the righties. Yarn over hook like in the picture and pass through, drawing up a loop. One Tss worked!!!

One row of Tss worked!!! It is hard to see right away because like knitting, Tunisian crochet will curl.

In this picture I am holding down the curled edge so you can see that a few rows of Tss have been worked. Each row of new Tss is picked up in the row of Tss previously made.

When you are done, you need to bind off your work just like knitting. You do this by working slip stitches across the row. This is referred to as “binding off” or BO. Start by working a Tss as per normal. There are two loops on the hook.

Use the hook to pull the loop you just made through the loop beside it. One stitch is bound off and one loop is on the hook. Do this for all stitches across, including the very last one.

Six stitches have been bound off so far.

All stitches bound off!! At this point, you would cut the yarn, leaving a tail for weaving in or sewing and proceed as per regular crocher or knitting.