How to make the little basket

I had some nice comments and emails about the little twine basket I made in my last post, so I crocheted another one at Craft Night yesterday – and this time I kept track of what I was doing so I could share it with you!

 

 

(Here I must beg forgiveness for the poor photo quality. It was a beautiful sunny spring day outside, so of course I decided to photograph indoors, because I’m clever like that. And of course I didn’t check the images as I went along because Dear Husband was working on the computer upstairs. “It will all be fine” will never be a thought in my head again.)

First you need a ball of twine, and a word of warning: This is not your usual crochet. Twine is stiff, and you have to work at this a bit to maintain tension and get the hook through. If you find the stitches too tight for the hook, go up a hook size and sip a glass of wine to relax your tension a bit. I’m a very tense crocheter, so I speak from experience! ;-).

You will get the flow of this once you’ve got past the initial first tiny rounds. Stick with it! It is totally worth the extra wee bit of effort – the effect is so lovely, but you also could try plain string with similar interesting texture.

So, with your twine and 5mm hook, chain 2.

Round 1: Work 6dc into first ch, join into a round with sl st

Round 2: 2dc into each st around, join round with sl st (12st)

Round 3: *1dc, 2dc in next st; repeat from * around (18st)

Round 4: *2dc, 2dc in next st; repeat from * around (24st)

Round 5: *3dc, 2dc in next st; repeat from * around (30st)

Round 6: *4dc, 2dc in next st; repeat from * around (36st)

Now here is where I stopped working the base of the basket and moved to make the sides. But this pattern is very flexible – if you want a bigger basket, continue rounds in the same sequence as listed above, adding an extra dc in each round, until you are satisfied with the width of the base. Then:

Round 7: Work 1dc in back loop only (BLO) of each st 

Round 8 – end: 1dc in each st until desired height is reached

I’m showing you the bottom of the basket so you can see the BLO round. See the ridge? I’ll put my hook in one to show you more closely.

Here is the basket before the fabric edge

I made this quite low because I wanted to complete it quickly to get this tutorial up! This can be as tall as you wish, just keep going round and round...

Like the twine, crocheting with fabric is a bit fiddly, but for the opposite reason – it is very loose and can twist to the wrong side easily. But again, you get into a groove after the first few stitches and it all comes together.

I thought I’d upcycle the scraps from my piped invisible zipper cushion I posted about here. I cut the leftover bias binding into roughly 1cm (1/2 inch) strips and tied the ends together to make a long length of fabric.

To work it into the twine, treat it as you would a colour change of normal yarn. Make a slip knot with the fabric on the hook

Then insert hook into any edge st

Yarn over, though in this case it’s fabric over, and pull back through, leaving two fabric loops on the hook

Then fabric over, and pull through both loops on the hook. First stitch complete!

 

One fabric dc in each stitch, then fasten off. I find that with these fabric strips, sometimes fastening off and weaving in the ends can be tricky because the fabric is wider than normal yarn, and hiding fabric in a contrasting twine basket is next to impossible. Feel free to see what works – and looks – best with the type of fabric you use. Here I simply tied knots with the ends of the fabric, then snipped off the tails and left the ragged ends on the inside of the basket edge to blend in with the ragged look of the stitches.

A fantastic book that offers lots of inspiration and patterns using unusual materials is this

I love Erika Knight’s designs, textures and colours. Here’s a peek inside, see what a wide range of ‘yarns’ she employs!

Let me know if you try a basket, and please send me photos. Have a lovely sunny weekend!

Chrissie x