Susan, a reader from North Texas, asked for help interpreting the Gazania instructions on pages 54-56 of Crochet Bouquet. I’m glad she did, because now I have an excuse to show you a piece that inspired elements of the Gazania and other flowers in the book.
First, Susan’s question:
I am trying to follow your Gazania pattern and am utterly frustrated by Rnd 3. You say to work around posts…
The best I can guess is that one should start with the yarn on top of the work, not behind as usual. (It would be useful to have specific direction on how to join for this situation.) In the first case, apparently one should work the first sc (around the post) toward the center of the flower, followed by the next post-surrounding sc going toward the petal.
Susan worked the problem out correctly on her own, in the italicized sentence above. The only tip I would add is to fold the piece so that double-crochet post you are to crochet around will be at the top. Crochet around it as if it were part of the row which continues up the side of the petal.
To begin Round 3 of the Gazania, start with a slip knot around your hook. Insert the hook around the dc (or under it if you have folded the piece), draw up a loop, then yarn over and draw the yarn through both loops on hook, as if you were making a regular sc.
She writes further:
Then you have to move the yarn away and force it in back of the work to proceed around the petal. Going between petals it seems necessary to take the yarn with you on top of the work and then back to the edge for the next petal.
I wouldn’t say that you have to “force” the yarn to the back of the work to proceed around the petal. The thread always comes out of the last stitch you crocheted. Keep going and hook the thread from wherever it is.
The pattern tells you to finish with a needle join (explained in the front of the book). The needle join finishes the row so that you can’t tell where the first stitch and last stitch are. It’s worth the trouble.
Now to the inspiration! This vintage crochet hot pad begins with a filet crochet base. The squiggles are double crochet stitches that stand up, perpendicular to the filet foundation. The standing double crochets are worked around the stems of the stitches below, and around the chain stitches that complete the filet squares. You could call this “surface crochet.”
Here’s the back or bottom of the piece. You can see the threads at the base of each dc, going around the uprights and cross pieces of the filet crochet foundation.
I looked at this little piece from time to time while I was developing patterns for Crochet Bouquet, wondering how I could apply the technique to a crocheted flower.
The Gazania is one of the results of studying the old piece of crochet. Round 3 is crocheted on the surface toward the middle of the flower, and then it changes to a regular round, worked into the tops of the stitches of Round 2 as you go around the petals.
Here’s the back of the Gazania, and you can see the threads at the base of each sc that was worked onto the surface of the flower. One of the sc-covered dc’s has a white ring around it, so you can see it better. See how it has the same look as the stitch-covered filet foundation on the hot pad?
There are twelve such covered stitches in the Gazania: you crochet outward on six of them, and back toward the center on the other six.