Broomstick Lace Crochet Tutorial

Hey everyone, it's Deja from CrochetEverAfter.com and today I'm going to show you how to make broomstick lace crochet. This is going to be the basics of how to make this stitch. How to put it on your stick, which I'm using a knitting needle, which I'll talk about in a little bit. How to put it on the stick and how to work it off of the stick. And I'll give you some pointers. and how to figure out if your pattern is reading different from what I'm showing you here. I'll give you all of that information and I'm going to be posting a free pattern workshop with this stitch in a shawl so make sure you subscribe if you want notification as soon as that's up. But first off we'll just get started on teaching you this stitch. Okay so what you're looking at right now is broomstick crochet. It is a very unique looking stitch and it actually is formed kind of in a circle so you can see these four strands coming up and coming around and then they continue on to the back where they also have four strands. This can vary depending on if you want to do three strands, five strands, however many strands you If you want, but. They all use a similar tool to make these loops, and what I'm using instead of a broomstick, because that's where the name broomstick crochet comes from, is it's thought to, or the women in the olden days would use an actual broomstick to put their loops on and work off of. What I'm going to be using is just a knitting needle. Let's see if I can put this back in front of you so you can see it. It's a ginormous knitting needle. It's 19mm or a US 35 knitting needle. The reason I'm using this is because instead of a broomstick where it would have a rounded end, it has this nice point. So it's very easy to feed my loops onto, which you'll see in a little bit, and it's also easy to pull them off. Plus, it has this handy dandy stopper here, so I can push all my loops and they're not going to fall off the other end. Also, a broomstick can be very long, so trying to set up a whole broomstick setup in your living room, wherever you may be crocheting, it's probably going to be kind of difficult. Plus, trying to find a broomstick these days that's just rounded on the end might be a little difficult. So I suggest or I recommend that you try out a knitting needle if you do not have the broomstick available. You can also get different sizes so if you want to make bigger loops you can get an even bigger knitting needle. They make those jumbo knitting needles now but lots of different options. So this is what I'm using for our project today and also to show you how to work it but But once again, it's a 19 millimeter knitting. Needle and we are going to get started and just the first thing that we're going to do to make a broomstick stitch is to begin with a foundation chain. So go ahead and put a slip knot on your hook and you're going to chain 25. So we're going to do groups of four broomstick crochets. So we just do normal chains. You can also, if you're just making it from this tutorial, you can do foundation single crochets because we're going to do a row of single crochets after this. So do 24 of those if you prefer foundation single crochets. If you have no idea what a foundation single crochet is, then we're just going to do some chains and then a row of single crochet and you can check out my foundation single crochet tutorials to learn about those. So get to 25 and then we'll start some single crochets. Okay, I've got 25. foundation chains and now I'm going to skip the first chain and work into my second chain and I'm going to start single crocheting. So we skip that first chain just to get our single crochets up to height. We're not counting that chain as a stitch. And we pull up our loop, yarn over, and pull through for a single crochet. I'm just going to grab the back loop all the way across, since this is just a tutorial and not a project. If this was a project where I'm not going to put an edging around it, then I would probably work into my bottom bump, so that it would look, or my edge would look a lot nicer, because I would have my two loops as my ending. But we're just going to go ahead and work some fast single crochets so we can get to the broomstick portion. So work across and then when we get to the end we're not going to turn our work, we're going to start our broomsticks. So grab your broomstick or your knitting needle or whatever you're going to be using to make your loops and we'll get started in just a second. Okay I've finished my 24 single crochets off of my 25 chains and now we are going to start making our broomstick stitches. So I'm going to pull up my loop, I'm not turning my work, I leave it right where it is at and I pull up my loop and I grab my stick, I'm just going to call my knitting needle a stick from now on so that way I don't have to say broomstick, knitting needle and all that back back and forth and I'm going to put it right Through the center of my loop and drop my loop off. If you have a tapered end like I have here, make sure that you're getting your loop to the even part of your shaft because all of your loops are going to be based off the size of what you're putting it around. So if you're putting it here, you're going to have smaller loops than what you have over here. So always push all your loops to the shaft or to the even part of your stick. Now, we're going to start putting more loops on. So this first loop goes with this first stitch, technically our last stitch of our first row. Our next loop we're going to pull up from our second stitch. So remember, count your V's or look for your V's for your stitches. So that very first V goes with that loop, so I'm going to put my hook into this next V. So just like as if I was working a stitch, except I'm working backwards, I'm going That way instead of normally that way. You're gonna put your hook through and then you have your tail back here. So don't worry if you get a little pulled out as you're working these because you can tighten them down. And I'm just gonna grab the yarn. I'm just gonna hook it this way because if I yarn over it will work as well. But you'll see that I get kind of a loop that I have to undo before I put on my needle. So you can just do a regular yarn over or you can just Go into your stitch and grab it facing downward so you can see I'm holding my tail with my fingers and I grab the loop and just pull it through. Now I don't have that twist that I have to undo so whatever is easier for you to grab your yarn with. After I do a few stitches I'm going to pull my yarn tight because if I get too far into it it's going to be difficult to tighten up my loops because I want my loops the same size and then I keep going. So I'm going to grab and pull up. This is very strange feeling when you begin. It's going to feel very foreign because it's nothing like a crochet stitch. So it takes a little bit getting used to, it takes a little extra time, but if you think about it, how tall these stitches end up being, it probably is about the same amount of time as if you were doing single crochets for that same amount of height. So once you get the hang of putting these onto your It's going to go a lot faster, but what we're doing is we're grabbing one loop for every stitch we have. So as I finish off a stitch, I go to my next stitch. Remember if you're having trouble finding your stitches, turn them sideways and find that V. Grab that loop, pull it up, pull on it. So you can see all of my loops are hanging tough. They're all staying the same size. So once you get across to all 24 loops, then we start working them off of our stick. So I'm going to keep pulling these up and adding them to my stick. You can squish them, so if you have a lot of loops, you can squish these. It's no problem. So you'll just get a little ruffle going on here, but you can squish them together. So if you have a small stick, you can still use it. A shorter knitting needle or a shorter stick can still make it. As you can see, I'm still having trouble getting back into the swing of the room stick. So I'm going to keep going until I get to the end of the row, and then we'll work on working off the loops. Okay, I'm on my very last loop that I'm pulling up. Now you can go ahead and double check that you have 24 or whatever stitch count you have if you're working from a pattern. So make sure that you have the right amount before you start working them off because you don't want to have to frog all that out and put your loops back on. Now, when we're working them off of our stick, there's two ways you can do it. You can either push everything off the stick and just let your loops hang Hang free and pull them together as you go, or you can leave them on the stick. I'm a big fan of leaving them on the stick because I'm always worried that I'm going to get very lopsided loops from pulling them all off at once. You can do whatever is more comfortable for you. I also like the tapered end of this because I can get onto my loops much easier because I can start pulling them off. You can see that I'll have this tapered end that I can get under my loops nice and easy rather than having a broomstick where it's all one size all the way across. So now we're going to work our loops off. So we're going to be working off in groups of four. Your pattern, if you're using a pattern, can have different groups of stitches. It could be three, it could be five, six, whatever it may be. We're going to stick with groups of four. We have 24 stitches, so we should have six broomstick stitches by the end. So what we're going to do is we're going to push our loops towards the end of our needle or stick and grab four loops. So I'm going to grab all four if I can get that last one here. I cannot seem to grab it. It doesn't want to come with me. Here we go. Okay, so I've got my four. I want to make sure that they are all even. So I give them just a little tug, make sure that they're good. And then what I'm going to do is I'm going to take my tail and I'm going to pull it through those four loops. So let me show you one more time. This is our very first row. We have our tail. Make sure that that very last loop is the size of your shaft. So if you need to double do that, go ahead and push them back on. Make sure it's the size of your shaft. Hold on to your tail so you have a good tension so it's going to stay the same size. Start pushing your loops off and insert your hook in to grab all four. Got that much easier that time. And I want to pull them all up so they're all nice and even. And then I'm taking my tail, and remember, it's connected all the way down here, so don't pull too tight because you're going to pull that last loop out. I'm going to pull it through all four loops. And then I'm going to slip stitch. I only do this slip stitch on this very first broomstick of the row. Everything else is going to be worked just normally. So this is just to lock in our stitch, get our height correct, and get everything situated. Good, correctly, correctly, goodly, whatever. So lock in that slip stitch, because it's not counting as anything. And now what we're going to do, we have four loops. So we're going to do four single crochets around the loops. So we have the four front loops, and we have the four back loops, and they're separated by that slip stitch. So we're going to put our hook right through those loops, yarn over, pull up a loop, and single crochet. So, you can see that the needle can be in your way when you're working it off the needle. So that's why some people like to pull all of them off the needle. I am just very wary of it, I like kind of grabbing them off. So I'm just going to work four single crochets in here. I've got three and I've got four. And now I'm done with this loop. So I have four loops, now I have four single crochets, now I'm ready for my next set of four. So I'm going to push my next set of four off, and grab them with my hook, and instead of doing a slip stitch, see my tail is over here connected to that last single crochet I did, so now I'm going to pull up my loops horizontally with my stitches, make sure they're all the same size. So if they get a little bit out of whack by doing this, When you're finished you'll get them all to the same height. And then I'm going to yarn over, pull up a loop, and do a single crochet. So that's my very first single crochet of this set. So I have to do three more, so you can see I have that nice big open hole. Put my hook through, make sure you get all four loops. I just missed one. Pull up your loop, another single crochet. So the J hook has nothing to do, because I'm using a J, a 6mm, has nothing to do with the broomstick portion. That's all with the knitting needle. The J is just going to give my single crochets the size that they are. So you could technically use a much smaller hook if you want really tight single crochets or a big hook. A big hook might not be a great idea, you might get real loopy ones and it may not look But depending on the size of your yarn is kind of what you want to go with for your hook. So if you're using like a lace weight, then you're probably going to want to use like a C or a B hook. So I'm going to push these off just so you can see kind of the people that like to do that. You might find it a lot easier than working it off of your needle or stick. So you can see they're all kind of everywhere. So you have to be careful when you take them off that you keep them in the correct order. So you can see that they have a front and a back. They're kind of side by side if you really look at it. So you need to choose, is the first... The one on the right is going to be in the front or the back, so normally it's in the front. So you want to make sure that when you're going through that you're catching these the right way. I'm going to grab four, pull it horizontal to get them all even, take my tail, pull it through, adjust the loops, and I have my loop ready for a single crochet. So I have one, two, three. Four, make sure that you don't change your hook size midway though, so Pick a hook size when you start because your single crochet is down here and you need to match your single crochet up here. Otherwise you're going to have like a triangle, so if you use a big hook down here and a little hook up here, the stitches are going to be smaller and tighter and more together. So again, make sure you've got your loops facing the correct way as you pick them up. Two, three, and four. They get a little twisted when you remove them from your knitting needle. I'm doing a slip stitch here. Make sure you don't pull through that. Loop on your hook that's already there. Three and four, I'm on my very last four. You see I've got the last one of the row. There's nothing special. You just keep working your stitches as normal. The only special stitch you do is that very first slip stitch of your row. Two, three and four So now you can see that I've got a whole row of broomstick crochet. All six of them. So depending on your stitch count, it could be much... Greater, they could have more loops. It can change depending on what the pattern tells you. You could also put regular stitches in between, so normally if you're just going to do stacked broomstick like we're going to do for the next row, you never turn your work. Good work. After your foundation chain, your work stays right side facing the entire time, so that's how you can also tell your right side from your wrong side. You have, well I'll show you after this next row, you'll be able to see it a little bit easier, but If you're turning your work, if you're going to put some single crochets or something in between your broomsticks, then of course you're going to turn your work and do those, but you want to keep your broomsticks right side facing so that you can see these pretty loops, because as you can see on the back side, they're not as visible because we have this loop here that gets kind of taken away. So that'll make more sense on this next row. I'll show you that again. But you want to work two rows so that you turn, work across, turn, work across, and then you're back to the front again. So, as I said, we don't turn our work. We pull up our loop, and we do our loops again. So you're going to start putting them back on. So remember that first single crochet is that first loop, so go into your next single crochet, pull up your loop. And these are going up and down a little bit, as you can see. They kind of go boop, boop. That's no big deal. That's what they do. That's a natural kind of thing that happens because it's a loop and not a straight stitch. So go across again another 24 loops. Might be a little easier this second row now that you're getting the hang of it. And then we'll meet up and work these off again so you can see the wrong side and the right side. Okay I've got all 24 loops back on my Stick, and I'm ready to start working off again. So as before, we don't turn our work, we just start sliding them off. You can do the whole slide off if you like that better. I've done this in a while, so now I'm starting to remember how I was sliding them off a little easier. So I pull them up, make sure they're good to go, pull that loop through. So you can see I'm pulling the loop through as I pull them off. So that it's ready to go. And then I'm going to do that slip stitch to tighten it down so that I have my height. As you can see my height over here is perfect, I don't have any squish stitches. So then I'm going to start doing my four single crochets. The center, needle back up, start sliding off four more. Slide off my single crochet right at the beginning. I'm doing this away from my lap. It's a lot easier if you can stick the needle kind of in your lap. Under your arm, somewhere where you can kind of wedge it so that it's kind of out of your way as you're working your single crochets. You may have to lay it down because I have the camera in my way, but if I was working it by myself, I would have the needle kind of wedged under my arm, and it makes it a little bit easier to get back and forth. So you can try doing that or wedging it in your lap, or just pull all the loops off if you like that better. I think it's a little bit faster working it right off the needle because you don't have to worry about if your loops are facing the right way. You can see I'm working these a lot faster than before. Almost done. I want to show you the wrong side of this. You can see the difference. So, we have the front side with all of our nice loops. You can see they look like they're kind of just stacked on top. And those single crochets that we did Are almost invisible. You can only see the loops that are coming around. So notice here we have stitches on top here You can't see them. If you flip to the wrong side, you'll see where they went. They got kind of pushed back Almost like if you're working a post stitch they the whole thing is back here So from working those broomsticks all of those get pushed back and you get kind of this ridged fabric So that's an important thing to remember if you're designing your own pattern. Do you want the ridges showing or do you want just loops? Once you're working, if you work a couple rows, if you want to put some spacing in between your brim stitches and put regular stitches, make sure that you figure out if you want just loops showing. So go two rows so that you get back to the right side facing. So those are some things to consider. That is the basics of broomstick. That's how you're going to put your loops on your stick and work them off. Depending on your pattern, it can change a little. So you could be doing three or five, like I said before. Read the pattern. Just work it the way that I showed, but with the stitches that the pattern gives you. So if you have any questions, make sure you leave them below. I will be putting up a free pattern workshop very quickly, or very soon, with brimstick, so that you can make a whole pattern, a whole shawl out of this. So look out for that, subscribe so you can get notification as soon as that shows up. But thank you for watching.