Tutorial for Twisted Garden
block designed by Kris Kelln Are you ready to begin? Round 1: Yes, you can do this however you like, but the end result should be 12 sc in a circle/loop of chain stitches, or whatever. I almost always end out with 13 when I think I have 12, so I actually make 11 Imao!! Somehow it works out for me. There's a hidden dimension in there, I'm sure of it! Mark your 'RIGHT SIDE' (as I don't but don't follow me exactly, just do as you are told). Then CHAiN one, and TURN... Round 2: TURN TO WRONG SIDE and work from there. Pop a sC and a trc in EACH stitch around. This sounds easier than it is, but you are trying to make little bobbly things that sort of pop out when you turn this back around again. You end out with something that looks like this (hopefully marked RS...):
Now you will get busy with Round 3. Not so bad. Your goal is 12 little clusters of 3 dc each. You will separate them by a ch-2 (one chain locks, one is extra). Start and join with a slip stitch to any trc, FROM THE FRONT (RS). Then chain three, so you have your first dc. That makes the start of your Beginning Cluster. Clusters like this are made with partially completed double crochets, all collected together at the end. Kris makes FouR dc per cluster in this pattern.
Make three more partial double crochets in that same treble that you joined to. (don't work the last step of the dc). If you do this correctly (remember, this is the BEGINNING CLUSTER), you will have four little loops on your hook.
..pull it through to finish the cluster (BEG CL)
..and chain two after that; one closes or locks the cluster (some people call that a locking stitch), and the next one is a spacer.
Now, skip the single crochet, and carefully dc into the triple crochet. It can be hard to isolate it, so work carefully. Make FOUR partial double crochets here,
altogether, then yo and pull through all FiVE loops on the hook (CL or CLUSTER).
Then chain two to complete it..
Carry on around, working a CL--CLUSTER in each trc only, and don't forget to ch 2 each time you make one. Then at the end, chain 2 and join it neatly to the first cluster. I like to do an Invisible Join here....but you can just slip to the top and fasten off however you like to do it. You should end out with TWELVE neat little clusters, all with a chain two separating them, and all of them worked only into the treble crochets.
Here I am working away on the next round. Those pesky 'what the heck does she really mean by trcCROSS over 3 dc??? Yeah... Sounds worse than it is! Just work your three dc into any of those chain 2 spaces...then get ready to make a treble crochet by yarn over the hook twice, as you were taught.
TAKE a DEEP BREATH.. Look at the photo. There are three dc. You want to poke your hook before the first of the three in the group, from the back, where the arrow is pointing.
Here you go, pop it on through there...
Then pinch the base in your left hand so you have room to manoeuver, and carefully pull your working yarn over the three double crochets, and over the hook....and finish that treble. Work softly and fairly loosely and RELAX your fingers lol. From this vantage point, you can't tell that there are three dc under that trc and it Looks like I'm actually working after the previous set, but I'm not.
Your finished treble IN FRONT of the three doubles should look like this :
And when all twelve of them are done (don't forget to ch 1 between each grouping), it will look like this:
Another version, from the front:
And from the back:
Now we'll move on to the 'Square off Round'... I like to do this one in BACK LOOPS ONLY of all the stitches. Essentially, you are working corners in every third chain (counting the chains as stitches). Skip where you are told to skip, and the math works out so the corners are in the chain stitches and some of the chain stitches are skipped, too. Work methodically, and you should get this. Double check your counts on each side' before you finish this round. So start with sl st and ch 2 as hdc in the second of a three dc grouping, and make two more hdc, one in the BLO of the next dc, and in the trcCROSS stitch....skip the chain st, sc in next 4 stitches, working in the BLO if you like, skip the chain st, hdc in the 3 dc, dc in the trcCross stitch, then make your CORNER in the back of the ch-1. Working this way, all the corners fall on the ch-1 space, and the other two ch-1 spaces of the side are skipped!
Remember, working in the BLO is optional--some people think it doesn't add anything.
Getting ready to make a corner trc:
Finishing the sides and corners as instructed:
Then you will be working the pretty little round of purely dc, with the occasional 'gap with a ch-1 over it. Corners as (2 dc, ch-2, 2 dc). 2 dc, skip, chain, 3 dc, skip, chain, 2 dc, skip, chain, 3 dc, skip, chain, 2 dc---next corner... It's a rhythm. Just when you get into the groove, it's over!! lol But it's pretty.
Then we have a pretty basic hdc spacer round...the counts here might be different than yours since these were tester blocks. 88 total hdc, 22 a side is the goal, with chain 2 spaces in all four corners.
Now you will flip your piece over again, and work on the back. We struggled with this round. I'm not that ‘intuitive' a worker on the “back side' since I learned to crochet in the round from the front. You have to be REALLY CAREFUL in figuring out where the stitches are exactly, and not mistake a final side stitch for a corner chain, etc. There are NO skipped stitches between the final sc on each side and the actual corner. There is also an ‘extra' sc on the end of each side, BEFORE the corner (this makes it symmetrical visually), but there is no skipped stitch before that little stitch either. There are skipped stitches otherwise, between every little clustery thingie. (sc, trc) Just do the best you can. There are no crochet police. Ignore my badge.. So flip 'er over and work on the BACK, and isolate that first stitch “before' the corner. If you think about it, since you are working from the back, it's sort of angled right into the corner, from off the last stitch of the side. Make a sc into that..
Then do as you are told--make 3 half doubles in the corner chain two space. Now you will be making TEN sets of (sc, trc) with a skipped stitch between each one. Carry on, and do that, then skip another stitch, make an ELEVENTH set of (sc, trc) in the second last stitch of the side, DO NOT SKIP, then sc in the last stitch of the side, which is angled again, into the corner space. And while you are doing this, MARK YOUR CORNER-MOST HDC, or you will swear at me on your last round. TRUST ME. You will have 11 groups of (sc, trc) on each side, each separated by a stitch that is skipped. There will be an extra sc following the last group, but no skipped stitch before it. There will be 3 hdc in the corner, with the cornermost one marked, right? Carry on:
From the back:
Now CAREFULLY stitch out Round 9 in sc--it's hard to find the stitches particularly the trc, but do your best, and 3 hdc in the corner marked stitch. Aren't you glad I got you to mark that? Does it look nice? Does it look like this?
And a final sc round finishes off the picture.
