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crocheting neckline edges
I’m a knitter, not a crocheter, I just never did learn! however, there are times in my knitting life where working with a crochet hook can really come in handy. Of course, the provisional cast-on comes straight to mind, but aside from that, I definitely enjoy crocheting edges when I’m looking for something really clean and simple. this video tutorial is geared towards knitters who are unfamiliar with crochet terminology (including myself!) and demonstrates the edging featured in both pink fluff pattern necklines. now, both of these patterns also include an alternate i-cord edging which does give a similar look so if you are just not into crochet hooks, period, or this method isn’t going well for you, by all means use that I-cord instead! for those that do know their crochet, i’ve been told (by an expert) that what I’m working on this neckline is a slip 1, chain 1, repeated around the entire neckline. so if those terms make sense to you, you probably don’t need this tutorial! if you do find this tutorial useful, there’s a donation button below!
the video tutorial includes all the audio you could want, most likely more repetitiveness than you need and even some written instructions that pos up on your screen from time to time, but I thought i’d really go deep in this blog post and explain in more depths each step of this process. if you’d rather jump straight into the video, the instruction itself begins at 1:45—feel free to skip my intro!
the big picture
the two main steps
there are two components of this neckline edging. the first is working into a stitch and the second part is chaining a stitch right afterward. both components are equally important. when you work into the stitch (whether it’s live from the provisional cast-on, or a stitch that you’d normally be picking up to knit), you’re joining your edging to your piece. when you chain a stitch, you’re adding a new stitch to create some elasticity so that the neckline will fit over your head. if you forget a chain a handful of times on your entire neckline, you probably won’t notice a difference, but if you’re not regularly working that second step, you’re gonna end up with a too-tight edging, as if you were just working a single crochet all the way around. also, do not, do not, do NOT pull each loop that you create tightly. You want to be creating loops that are stable and as consistent as possible, but you want them to be on the looser side—again, for elasticity. if you find that you are creating your loops too snugly, you can consider chaining a second stitch to help make up for it, but you’re better off if you can convince you fingers to not pull those loops too tight! another one of the nice things about this edging in general is that you’re always going to be wrapping your yarn around the crochet hook in the same way. you’re not ever going to be reversing the way you wrap, so once you’ve gotten the wrapping process down, it’ll just be on repeat.
workin’ it
i’m going to follow the instruction order as to how it’s shown in the video, so the first portion deals with live stitches on knitting needles and then we go to working into stitches that are on the edge of your garment and not on your needles. in the pink fluff patterns, you’ll be working with both types of stitches, but if you want to use this edging on another sweater (or another part of the garment other than the neckline) it is 100% fine to be working all the way around on live stitches or all the way around the edge of the garment without knitting needles at all. they do not need to be combined, that just happens to be the way I constructed these two sweaters.
section 1: working stitches on live needles
the nice part about using your crochet hook in combination with your knitting needles is that you’re really just replacing your right hand needle with a crochet hook instead. in fact, you could likely perform this edging with knitting needles only, but I think having the hook to grab the yarn really helps to facilitate and expedite the process, so that’s why i’m demonstrating it In this particular way. the first set of stitches you’re working with in pink fluff are those that were provisionally cast-on, so before you begin working the steps below, you should have removed that cast-on and placed your set of live stitches on working needles. go ahead and set those down as you’ll need to prepare your crochet hook with working yarn before continuing as follows: with the yarn you’ll be using for your edging, make a slip knot and place it onto your crochet hook. snug it up, but don’t make it super tight (see above!) hold your hook in your right hand and pick up your knitting needles with your left hand, ready to work the right side of those live stitches. here we go!
insert the crochet hook into the first live stitch as if to knit, creating an X just as you would if you were using two knitting needles. your crochet hook will be situated behind your left hand needle, angled to the left, and your left hand knitting needle will be angled to the right.
making sure not to use the tail from your slip knot, wrap the working yarn behind the hook, from right to left, and then over the top of the hook to create a counter clockwise loop—this is actually a yarnover on your crochet hook. i’m going to say this again, keep the loop on the looser side. you’ll now have two loops on your crochet hook: one at the bottom/right (closest to the handle) and then a second newly created loop sitting towards the hook end, above your left hand knitting needle.
using the hook to grab hold of your newly created loop while keeping just enough tension on the working yarn so that it does not fall off your hook, pull it through the stitch on your needle. you will still have two loops on your crochet hook and remember, you don’t want them to be too tight.
if you didn’t automatically do this in the previous step, slide the stitch from your left hand needle off of it, as it has now been worked. you’ve still got two loops on your crochet hook but now you don’t have a knitting needle in between them.
the next step can be done in two different ways, either by using the hook or your left hand needle, but the result will be the same. i’m writing the process out separately below, so only work it in the way that is most comfortable for you. my recommendation is to keep trying option 1 and only resort to option 2 if you really can’t get it. the more comfortable you become with your hook, the easier the entire process will be.
option 1: use the hook to grab your newly created top loop and draw it through the bottom loop
option 2: use your left hand needle to grab the bottom loop and slip it over top of the newly created loop
you are now down to having only one loop on your hook and you’ve completed the first component of this process! now we will move into the second, adding the chain stitch so that you’ll have enough of an edging to fit over your head.
section 2: chaining after working every. single. stitch.
now for the even easier part! working a single chain stitch. if you’ve ever worked a provisional cast-on with a crochet hook, you probably already know how to chain a stitch because typically you chain a few stitches, then start your cast-on—which Is essentially chaining with a knitting needle In the middle of the chain—then end your cast-on by chaining additional stitches once you have the correct number of stitches on your needles. You can even chain all of the stitches in your provisional cast-on and then insert your needle into each loop afterwards. i’ll still be very descriptive here and write this for anyone who has never worked a crochet chain. at this point in our process, we have worked steps 1-5 from above and are back down to having only a single loop on our crochet hook. I’ll refer to this loop as the bottom loop as I did above. and yes, these steps below are going to sound familiar.
work as for step 2 in section 1: wrap the working yarn behind the hook, from right to left, and then over the top of the hook to create a yarnover on your crochet hook. once again, you’ve got two loops.
work as for step 5 in section 1: once again you can feel free to use your knitting needle to help, but If you get the hang of using your hook it’ll be more efficient if you can use it alone to chain your stitch. use the hook to grab your newly created top loop and draw it through the bottom loop. if you’re not confident enough with your hook yet, refer to option 2. you are now back to a single loop on your needle and…
ta da! you’ve chained a stitch!
section 3: repeat, repeat, repeat
for the entire section of provisionally cast-on stitches, you’ll be working {steps 1-5, step 2, step 5} all the way until all of your live stitches are worked. just don’t forget that chain. if you have to pause mid-process, or you just forget whether you’ve chained or not, take a look at your work. if you’ve completed the chain, you’ll see an unattached loop/stitch sitting on “top” of the loop that’s connected to your neckline edge. whereas if you’ve not yet chained, the last loop you see will be incorporated into the actual neckline edge. once you’ve worked all of your live stitches, it’s time to move onto the remainder of the edging.
section 4: working stitches along your edging
this process is almost the same as working with live stitches, only it Is a bit easier because you don’t have a knitting needle involved, therefore you don’t need to remember to slide the stitch you just worked off your needle (step 4 from the very first section). when you get to this section of edging in both pink fluff patterns, you will already have a loop on your crochet hook because you’ll have just completed working each stitch involved in the provisional cast-on, so you don’t need to create a slip knot. however if you are using this edging for something else where all your stitches were cast-on in standard fashion, or have been bound off, you will need a loop on the hook to begin, so only if you do not already have a loop on your crochet hook, create a slip knot, place it on your hook, snug it up, but not too tightly, just as I described in the set-up for working from live sts. bottom line, you will always need a single loop on your crochet hook prior to working into a stitch whether it is live or on an existing edge.
before beginning your work, examine your edging to determine a consistent location into which you’ll be inserting your crochet hook. If you are used to picking up stitches, the point of insertion for the crochet hook is exactly the same as where you would be inserting your right hand needle if you were to pick up and knit that stitch instead. In the video, my demonstration shows a bound off edge so it’s easy to see the loops into which I am working. I recommend using only one of those loops and it is the one that is closest to you when you’re looking at your work. It will be easy to see this loop along your front cable cast-on edge as well, but the diagonals are a little trickier to see. the most important thing is not necessarily where you insert your hook but that you maintain consistency (same goes for picking up and knitting!). I recommend using either the second or third leg along vertical or diagonal edges: Each knit stitch consists of two legs, so when I say the second leg, I am referring to the interior leg of the first stitch (from the edge of your work), where the third leg is referring to the exterior leg of the second stitch. once you’ve taken a good look at your fabric and have a plan of insertion, you’re ready to roll. you should have a single loop on your crochet hook and know where it’s going to go.
insert crochet hook into the leg of your chosen stitch or the loop of your cast-on edge as if you were going to pick up and knit a stitch.
work as for step 2 in section 1: but i’ll write it out again for you, wrap the working yarn behind the hook, from right to left, and then over the top of the hook to create a counter clockwise loop. your pre-existing loop is at the bottom/right (closest to the handle) of the hook and your second newly created loop is sitting towards the hook end with the leg/loop of your project edge in between the two loops on your hook.
work as for step 3 in section 1: are you starting to see that even though your stitches are coming from different places, they are all being worked in virtually the same way? the only difference between step 3 in section 1 here is that you won’t have the knitting needle in between: using the hook to grab hold of your newly created loop, pull it through the stitch into which your hook is inserted. your two loops on your crochet hook are now situated on “top” of your project fabric.
work as for step 5 in section 1: since we don’t have to slide a stitch off a needle, you’ll go straight to step 5. once again, you can either pick up a knitting needle to help you pull the bottom loop over the top loop, or you can use your crochet hook to pull the top loop through the bottom loop. at this point, since you no longer have knitting needles in hand, it will be much more efficient to use only the crochet hook.
And that’s how you work into your fabric edging. It’s hardly different from working into live stitches at all.
section 5: it’s time to chain again
this time I’m not going to rewrite it, but after going through steps 1-4 in section 4, you will work the steps from section 2, exactly the same as you did after each stitch in section 1.
section 6: repeat, repeat, repeat
yup, every time you insert your hook into an edging leg/loop, you’ll work the entirety of sections 4 & 5. continue until you get all the way around to where you began with your live stitches along the provisionally cast on edge and then, move on to finishing up.
finishingd
nothing fancy is happening here! once you’ve worked each stitch (and the chain that follows) you’ll be back to where it all began. break your yarn with a 6”/15 cm or so tail. Go ahead and stretch your final loop on the crochet hook large enough that it’s easy to thread your tail through and pull it snugly to secure. with a tapestry needle, use your tail to connect the end of your edging to the beginning, doing your best to mimic the way the strands look in the rest of the edging.
that’s all folks!
I hope that this tutorial gives you a great edging option! although I’ve written it in the order that follows the instructions in ruffle fluff & lacey fluff, remember that it doesn’t matter whether you’re working from live stitches or from existing edges. this is a beautifully neat & clean way to finish off a project, especially when you don’t want to detract from other detailing that deserves to shine. if you’ve enjoyed this content and found it useful, there’s a donation button below!