Tiny Potholder & Tutorial

Here is a little potholder I made last night. It took me about a half hour. As you can see, it is only about 4 inches square! It will be part of a set I'm designing for a child's gift. (Today I'm going to try an oven mitt.)

Here is the basic pattern, but please don't hold me to the numbers. Just wing it if you want to make it--I wing things all the time, LOL!

I chained about 15 stitches using cotton yarn (Sugar N Cream, for example) and a size G hook.

Then I did a half-double crochet (HDC from here on) in the second chain from the hook.

Then I skipped a stitch and did a single crochet (SC) and a HDC together in the next stitch.

Keep going across like that: skip a stitch, then SC and HDC in the next. You might have to do a single crochet in the end to even it out depending on how many chains you started with.

On the next row (row 2), you will start with a chain 2, then you'll do an SC and HDC in all the single crochets across. Frankly, I just looked for the biggest gap and used that. You won't be skipping any stitches now, btw.

Keep on repeating row 2 until you get a square, then fasten it off.

Now take a coordinating color and do a single crochet all around the square. Make 2 SCs at each corner to make it 'bend' easier.

You make the ruffle like this: slip stitch in one SC then do 3 double crochets in the next stitch. Keep alternating like this until you are done.

I think if I had started the ruffle at a corner, then ended there, my loop would have worked out better. As it happened, I had to make it separate.

I will post more 'tiny kitchen' projects as I make them! Meantime, of course I'm still working on all my other projects! Not much else to do with all that snow outside. If I don't have to go out (and I don't) I'm not going to!