Surface Crochet Technique

The Advent 'gift' for Day 19 is the following technique tutorial.

You can copy and paste it if you want to keep it as a reference later on.

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Surface Crochet:

Surface Crochet is a great way of adding decoration and extra interest to your crochet or knit pieces once they are fastened off. Surface crochet looks the same as sewn chain stitch, which is a common embroidery stitch.

Hold the yarn you wish to use for the surface crochet at the reverse of the work:

Insert your hook into the required place – you will see that crochet stitches make consistent holes, so simply choose which line you wish to follow. Catch the yarn at the reverse side of the work:

Draw the yarn through to the front of the work using your hook, making sure to anchor the tail end of the yarn at the back of the work so that the stitches do not slip through to the front side of the work:

Insert your hook into the next hole:

Draw the yarn through to the front of the work using your hook (2 loops on hook):

Draw first loop through the second to create a slip stitch:

Continue in this way to create your chain stitch design:

Once you have completed your design, cut the yarn tail:

Draw the tail through to the front of the work and thread through the eye of a sewing needle. Sew around first chain as in the image below:

The images below show surface crochet on a background of double crochet: