To get started, you're going to need SIX (6) strands of scoubidou, 4 of which
are at least 3 feet long, and 2 which are at least 5 feet long. The longer
strands should ALWAYS be 2 feet longer than your shorter strands to insure you
don't run out of these strands before you run out of the shorter strands.
Set aside two of the shorter strands, and use one of the longer strands as the
center strand of three that will cross the first long strand when starting the
SuperBrick Stitch. The first step to starting a Fluted Columns is to start a SuperBrick Stitch.
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Here's the
SuperBrick started. The purple strand, between the yellow and green, is the
second long strand of scoubidou. The black one also shown here is the first
long strand. |
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Now do
another stitch of SuperBrick, but leave this stitch loose... |
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...hold
the stitch on the outside and grab one of the loose purple strands, as shown
(I'm holding the end on the left of the photo). |
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Now push
the purple strand back through the stitch to create a loop on the right side
of the stitch. |
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Move the
other two strands on the right side of the stitch (the yellow and green
strands) out of your way... |
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...by
pushing them down towards the bottom of the stitch. |
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Hold them
out of your way with your left hand, so all you'll see is the purple loop and
purple strand on the right side of the stitch, as shown here. |
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Hold one
of the two remaining short strands at it's center... |
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...and
place the center of this strand (the red one in this photo) below the purple
strands. |
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Take the
red strand on the side with the single purple end (NOT the side with the
purple loop) and go over the single purple end, then under (or through) the
purple loop... |
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...like
this. |
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Now take
the other end of the red strand, go over the purple loop, then under the
single purple strand, just as you see here. |
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Which
should end up like this... |
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...and
after you pull the purple loop a bit tighter, you can see that you've created
a Square Stitch to the right of the SuperBrick Stitch! |
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Now hold
the other side of the stitch on the outside, so you can grab the other purple
strand (the loose end on the side you just created the Square Stitch on)... |
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...push
this purple end to the left to create a loop on the other side of the
SuperBrick stitch, then move the green and yellow strands on this side out of
your way. |
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Place the
center of your last short strand of scoubidou under the purple strands on the
left of the SuperBrick. |
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Once
again, start by taking the end of this new strand (blue here) that's on the
side of the single purple strand (NOT the side with the purple loop) and take
it over the single purple strand, then under or through the purple loop... |
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...while
the other end goes over the purple loop, then under the single purple strand.
Can you see why we always start on the side with the single purple strand? If
we didn't, the Square Stitch we are trying to make here would fall apart on
us... |
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...and
here's our 2nd Square Stitch. |
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I like to
call this "the mess", as it DOES look like a monstrous goo of
strands, but if you look at it closely, you can see how each and every strand
is in the right place, so that when we tighten the stitch up, no portions of
the stitch will fall apart. |
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After
we've pulled this first stitch tight, it looks somewhat like a plus sign.
When pulling the stitch tight, start by pulling the yellow, purple, and green
strands away from each other, then switch to pulling the blue, black, and red
strands away from each other. Do this several times using short pulls to make
sure your finished stitch looks similar to the one shown here! |
