Left Hand Treble Crochet Tutorial #2: TR in the Foundation Chain

Hi everyone, this is Deja from crochetforeverafter.com and right now I'm going to show you how to treble crochet into your foundation chain. If you've never done treble crochet before, be sure to check out my treble crochet for beginners. Otherwise, this will show you just how to work into that foundation chain. I have my foundation chain already made. I have 13 chains and I'm going to treble crochet into, I'm going to end up making 10 treble crochets out of these 13 chains. Now, working into your foundation chain in treble crochet, you have to remember how many stitches you need or how many chains you need to skip before you insert your hook. And each stitch has its own amount of chains that you skip. So a single crochet is one, half double crochet is two, treble crochet is three. So that would mean a tre- a dub- sorry, a treble crochet would need four chains skipped. So I'm going to be working into the fifth chain from my hook. for my very first treble crochet. The reason being is because this stitch is so tall, you need four chains skipped to get the proper height. So I'm going to yarn over twice, which is how you begin every treble crochet, and I'm going to count back from my hook. I don't count the loop that's on my hook, that is my working loop. I only count the The V's that I see below. So my letter V's, which are my chains, I count 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. So I'm going to insert my hook into this chain here. I like to just work into the back loop if I'm not concerned with how my bottom edge looks. It's the fastest for me, I easily can grab it and do any kind of stitch very quickly. You can also catch your bottom bump with that back loop if you like to have two loops caught. You can work just into this bottom bump, which are those little dashes that you see on the bottom, and if you work into this bottom bump, it takes a little bit longer, but it gives you a nice V-edge on the bottom. Just like if you're doing a foundation treble crochet. So I'm just going to catch this back loop because that's fast and easy, and I'm going to make sure that all of my loops stay the same size as my shaft, and I'll lay over my yarn. I like to call it a layover because you're just kind of laying it over to catch it, but it's really a yarn over if you were reading a book. And I pull that loop up, then I make sure it's the same size as my shaft. By keeping all the loops the same size as my shaft, I keep even consistent stitches and I'm not going to have a wavy project at the end. They're all going to stay the same height. So I'm going to yarn over and as you work any stitch above a double crochet, when you start getting these loops off of your hook, you're always going to go in groups of two. So I yarn over and I pull through just the first two loops and that creates my first twist. I like to call it a twist because it kind of looks like it's twisting around. Then I yarn over, and I pull through the next two loops, and I get my second twist. Then I yarn over, and I still have two left, and I pull through both of those, and I have my third twist. So you can see that I pulled my yarn through three times, which might be where the name treble crochet came from, because you're pulling it through three times. So then I go into my next chain, which is this next back loop, yarn over, Pull up that loop, push everything to my shaft so I get them all nice and even. Yarn over, pull through the first two. Yarn over, pull through the next two. Yarn over, pull through the last two. So everything above a double crochet, that's how you're going to get the loops off of your hook. It's always in groups of two. It never changes. A double treble is going to have four draws of two loops each. So everything above a double crochet, that's all you're doing, is just drawing through and pulling through two loops every single time. So it makes it very easy as long as you remember how many yarn overs to do in the beginning. So treble is always two yarn overs, not three like you would think because it's called a treble. So yarn over twice. And a trick to keep your hook from catching when you're working through your stitches Is to point it down towards your work. It slides through easily when you point it down. If you find that you're getting stuck when you're trying to pull your hook through, point it straight down at your work and pull through. It's going to pull through easily through every kind of stitch, even if it's a really tight stitch. So you work right across your foundation chain and because of the chains that I skipped at the very beginning of my work, I end up having 10 treble crochets at the end of this. I count this very first chain 4 as my first treble crochet because it's so big and bulky, it looks like a stitch, so most designers will count anything above a double crochet or double crochet and above the chains as an actual stitch. So, so far I have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 stitches, so I should have 3 chains left. We can count our V's and we see 1, 2, and 3. That's also good if you're not sure. Sometimes this last foundation chain can get a little bit squished. When you're just beginning your foundation chains, you might tighten that one down. So if you're not sure if you should work into it, if it's part of your slip knot or not, go ahead and count your stitches and make sure that you have the amount that you're supposed to have. So I know I'm supposed to have 10. So I just count and make sure that I have all ten. So that is how you're going to work into your foundation chain. You can go ahead and check out the next part of the tutorial where it's working into your first stitch of your row to see that.