Truly Hooked Bath Puff Pattern. You will need: A 4mm crochet hook A tapestry needle for darning in ends Scissors No more than 50g of a cotton or bamboo based DK yarn I use King Cole Bamboo cotton, which comes in a huge range of colours, and is machine washable. It is also hard wearing which makes it perfect for an item like this. Most importantly, I think, I feel soft against the skin and that s the selling point for me, because who wants to wash themselves with anything other than the softest of the soft? It s a pretty good price as well, at around 4 for a 100g ball. You can get it from Knit Nottingham, my favourite yarn store, by following this link http://knitnottingham.co.uk/shop/product_info.php/cpath/121_22_27/product s_id/42 Its up to you whether you want to go for one colour, or to mix and match. I personally like to mix and match, because this project is a great way to use up scraps you may have from other projects. 50g is a definite overestimate of what you need, but you want to make sure you have more than enough there s nothing worse than running out when you re almost done! Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 1
So, once you ve got everything ready, get your self comfy and lets get started! You need to know how to chain, slip stitch and treble crochet. Don t worry if you don t know, I ll talk you through it as we go. To make the circle pieces: You need to begin by making a slip knot with your yarn onto your hook. To do this, first make a loop with your yarn, like so: Then pull the bit of yarn attached to the ball through the centre of the loop: Pop your hook in, ensuring the tails of the yarn point downwards: 2 Copyright Truly Hooked 2013
Pull the short tail to tighten up the loop on the hook: Its important you don t pull this too tight because it ll make it hard for you to work into it in a minute. Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 3
Now, we re going to do a few chain stitches to begin with. These are super simple to do. Just catch the yarn with your hook, and pull it through the loop, like this: Catch the yarn, Twist slightly, and pull through the loop, making a chain stitch! Look! A little chain stitch! You need to do 4 of these, ready to begin working your first circle. You are going to be working all of the next stitches into the fourth chain from your hook. This is the chain that my needle is pointing to here: 4 Copyright Truly Hooked 2013
We re now going to be working in treble crochet. (Note that in American patterns this is referred to as double crochet, just to confuse you). Working in treble crochet, work 7 stitches into the fourth chain from your hook. Its really important these all go into the same place. You can see my needle is showing you where that chain is as you make more stitches into it. Don t worry at this stage if the hole you re working into starts to get bigger, infact its good that it does open up a bit because that s where you will be threading your string through later to hold everything together. Once you ve worked your 7 trebles, you should have something that looks like this: Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 5
I ve joined the loop together by making a slip stitch at the top of the first stitch. You can see in the picture below, that s where my needle is pointing. You make the slip stitch by inserting the hook into the top of the chain stitches you made at the very beginning, catching the yarn and pulling it through all the loops on your hook. Now, make three chain stitches to begin the next round. This length of chains also counts as your first treble crochet stitch in this round. You now need to make a treble stitch into the bottom of the three chains. This is shown by my needle in the picture above. Continue to work in treble crochet, and make TWO stiches in every stitch from the previous round. This is known as an increase. You can see in the picture below that my needle is pointing to the top of the stitch from the previous round, where I have just made two new treble stitches. 6 Copyright Truly Hooked 2013
You need to do this all the way around, and join the round together at the end using a slip stitch. Now for the third round. Make three chain stitches and treble in the bottom of the chains. Work in treble crochet, increasing in every stitch all the way around. Join with a slip stitch at the end. The fourth round is exactly the same as the third round. You ll find as you continue to work the stitches that the fabric will start to ruffle a bit. Don t worry, that s what you want to happen! At the end of the fourth round, once you ve joined with a slip stitch, pull the yarn through the loop on your hook for a final time to ensure it is secure, and snip the yarn leaving a tail of about 6 inches. Pull firmly to be sure the end is fastened tightly. Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 7
You have your first completed circle for your bath puff! You now need to repeat this until you have at least 8 circles. You can make more if you want to, and sometimes you need to depending on your colour repeats (I like to use three circles in three different colours sometimes). The next step is to make the central string that will hold everything together. You do this by making a chain of at least 100 stitches. I usually do around 130. It needs to be long enough to fold in half, knot at one end, fit the stack of circles on, and leave enough to hang your bath puff up. You can keep folding the chain in half as you work to see how long it will be. If in doubt, chain more rather than less. Once you ve made your chains, snip the yarn leaving a tail and pull the end firmly to tighten up the last stitch. Fold your chain in half and tie to the two ends together. I tend to know it three or four times, tightly, to be sure it s secure. 8 Copyright Truly Hooked 2013
You then want to make a knot at the very end of the string. I knot three times so you have quite a large knot. Each time I push it down to be sure it sits at the end of the string. Now we need to sew those loose tails into the knot to make it neat. Thread the tails through a tapestry needle and then push the needle into the knot, a few times so the ends are worked into it. Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 9
Once you re happy, then snip the tails as close you can to the knot, and there s your central string! The next stage is a bit tricky, but is really really important so take your time to be sure you get it right. To join everything together: Thread the string through the centre of one of your circles. You may need to tease the hole in the centre open a little bit. I often pop my hook in a jiggle it around a bit. 10 Copyright Truly Hooked 2013
Now thread the tail at the centre of the circle through your needle, and pull the tail firmly to close the hole. Sew in the tail ensuring it goes into the knot through the centre string Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 1 1
and also works into some of the stitches in the circle. Once you re happy the tail is sewn in properly, snip the yarn as close as you can to the fabric, without actually snipping the fabric! That s your first circle attached. You also need to sew in the tail at the edge of the circle so you have a neat finish. Repeat this process with each circle, ensuring you tighten it round the string, and also push them firmly downwards each time to keep them tightly together. The tail should be sewn into the centre string, and worked into the stitches of the circle. Don t forget to sew the tails on the outer edge of the circles in as well. 12 Copyright Truly Hooked 2013
Once you have your completed stack of circles attached to the centre string, push them down firmly and tie a knot three or 4 times with the centre string to hold them all in place. Throw your puff between your hands a bit to fluff it up, and there you go finished!! Copyright Truly Hooked 2013 1 3