Technique Tuesday – Adjustable Ring for Working Crochet In the Round

How To Make the Adjustable Ring for Working Crochet In the Round

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Technique
Adjustable Ring for Working Crochet In the Round

What is it?
The Adjustable Ring is a technique for starting any project where you will be working crochet in the round.

This same technique has also been called Adjustable Loop, Magic Loop, Magic Ring, and probably has several other monikers that we just haven't run across yet. Regardless of the name, the technique is the same in that it provides a Ring or Loop as a base that you then work your first round of stitches into so you can then proceed to crochet in the round.

Please note that at this point we have shown great restraint by not making even one reference to one ring ruling them all. Not one… just wanted to point that out…

Click Read More below for the full tutorial.

Why Use It?
The Adjustable Ring technique for starting to crochet in the round is, of course, one of at least three common methods for starting to crochet in the round. In addition to the Adjustable Ring, there is a Slip Ring, and a Chain Ring.

The advantage the Adjustable Ring holds over the other two techniques is the Adjustable Ring cuts down on your finishing time when you get to that step that says "Weave in all ends."

So I guess you could say that, while there are three rings, there's really only One Ring to Rule Them All! Yup… couldn't resist it any longer… it had to be done.

By working your first round of stitches over the loops of the Adjustable Ring, the Tail is pre-woven in and all you need to do is snip off the excess length of Tail. This comes in particularly handy when you have an entire garment made of motifs and are facing down 40 or 50 Tails that need woven in. And don't get us started on that kind size motif afghan you just crocheted with 230 tiny motifs… ALL THOSE TAILS!! If you use the Adjustable Ring technique for starting your motifs… you won't feel like you need to enter therapy just to face all that finishing work.

NOTE: While we don't advocate the "quick and easy" approach to hand crafted items like crochet or knitted pieces, if we can save a step by utilizing a simple technique like the Adjustable Ring, you can bet yer sweet bippy we're gonna us it!

The Adjustable Ring is a perfect technique for working the first round of top down hats, the toes of socks or slippers, mittens made from the fingers to the wrist, the bottom of market bags… anyplace you want a secure, tight first round, this is a FAB technique to use.

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To Work Today's Tutorial
Here's a list of materials we used to make today's Adjustable Ring tutorial. While you can, of course, use any materials you have on hand, these materials listed are what we recommend you use while you are learning.

Yarn Used
CYCA 4
Worsted Weight, 100% Pure Wool

Hook Used
H-8/5.00mm Crochet Hook

Skillz Used
Adjustable Ring
Single Crochet

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Break It Down

1. Hold the yarn so the Tail is in front of your hand and the Working Yarn (the yarn coming directly from your skein or ball) is behind your hand. Yes, I am right-handed so this tutorial is photographed that way but the instructions are still the same: Tail in front, Working Yarn in back.

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2. Wrap the Working Yarn loosely around your first finger two tims. We found it helpful here to make sure the wraps (loops) did not cross or become tangled together. This makes the Adjustable feature of the Adjustable Ring work more smoothly later on.

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3. Holding the loose loops securely in place with your thumb, insert your crochet hook under the loops.

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4. This is where things become a little fiddly when you first try this technique so be patient with yourself… There's no need to scream and throw your hook across the room where it will scare the Shibakidz and become lodged in the wall and ruin the patina paint effect… just sayin'… It doesn't stay fiddly forever… moving on…

Still securing the loops of your Adjustable Ring with your thumb, tension the Working Yarn as you normally would (although this hold you see in the photo is not how I normally tension my yarn… it's just part of the "fiddly" stuff we mentioned… adjust yours as needed) and prepare to draw up a loop.

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5. And draw up a loop through the Adjustable Ring. Don't fret if the loops of the Ring become a little twisted looking here. As long as you are securing them with your thumb, you are still in great shape.

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6. Again with that fiddly tensioning hold on the Working Yarn, continue to secure the loops of the Adjustable Ring in place with your thumb and yarn over and prepare to make a chain stitch.

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7. Chain 1 completed. You can clearly see that the Tail is still in the front of my hand (in the palm of my hand), the loops of the Adjustable Ring are still held securely with my thumb, and the Working Yarn is still tensioned and behind the work.

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8. Now we're ready to go!

Insert your hook back through the loops (still held securely by your thumb) of the Adjustable Ring in preparation for making your first Single Crochet stitch.

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9. Make a Single Crochet as usual: Yarn over and draw up a loop (2 loops on hook)…

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10. And yarn over and draw through both loops on hook. Your first Single Crochet stitch in you Adjustable Ring is complete. WOOHOO!!

Moving on… 

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11. Here's a flat shot of what that first Single Crochet stitch and Adjustable Ring should look like.

You can clearly see the Tail coming from the bottom left of the Adjustable Ring and the Working Yarn coming from the left of the Single Crochet Stitch. The two loops are still intact and untangled and we are ready to move on to our next stitch!

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12. Repeat Step #8 and VOILA you have a second Single Crochet stitch worked in the loops of your Adjustable Ring.

Note: At this point, we are still working our stitches over both loops AND the Tail.

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13. Now… here's another little fiddly bit that we found EXTREMELY important to ending with a snug little ring at the end of our round.

Notice anything different about the size of the Adjustable Ring in this photo and the size of the Adjustable Ring in the photo from Step #12? Yup… we engaged the Adjustable part of Adjustable Ring.

Holding the two Single Crochet stitches, give the Tail a gentle pull until the loops beneath the stitches start to move… ya know… adjust. You will notice that one loop will tighten up smaller than the other loop at first. That first loop that tightens up is the loop directly attached to the Tail. After this first adjustment, just fiddle around with the smaller loop to tighten up the larger loop making it smaller. Continue to work around with the loops until you get them both to the desired size. Again, this does take a little fiddling the first few times but, eventually, it is a quick pull and a pluck and you're on your way again.

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Side Note
Wait… why do any of this fiddling?? Why not just wait until the end of the round to pull the Tail and close up the Adjustable Ring? Good question…

When we were working with different yarns and working different stitches into the loops of the Adjustable Ring, we discovered there were times when we could wait until ALL of our stitches were worked THEN tighten the ring with the Tail.

On the other hand, we found there were times when waiting until ALL of the stitches were worked into the ring THEN pulling on the Tail to snug the ring up caused a big ol' jam up and that second ring just wouldn't tighten up neat and tidy. The result was a bunch up of yarn that stuck out between the stitches of the tightened ring… it looked messy and sloppy and we just weren't happy with it.

Now… that said… If you are going to leave the center of your Adjustable Ring open slightly (as some motifs call for), you might be just fine waiting until the end of your round to tighten the Tail. However, even then, we found this little fiddly bit of making the loops of the Adjustable Ring slightly smaller before we proceeded gave us better results in the end.

Also, if we were working with a slick yarn that pulled easily through the first round of stitches, we were able to wait until the end of that first round to close the loops of the Adjustable Ring.

Like we always say, experiment with different yarns and different stitches to see what gives you which results. In the case of this tutorial, we are using 100% wool and the fibers stick together rather than slide easily past each other. Adjusting the loops of the Adjustable Ring early on gave us better results.

Okay… on to the next step…

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14. Now that we've closed up the loops of the Adjustable Ring a bit, we can continue to work our round of Single Crochet Stitches. In this case, we worked a total of 10 Single Crochet stitches into the loops of the Adjustable Ring.

Notice something here about where the Tail is? It's still hanging out there by those first two Single Crochet stitches. Again, this is just a little twist on the Adjustable Ring technique that we found helpful. After making those first two Single Crochet stitches, we found that working the remaining stitches of the round ONLY over the two loops of the Adjustable Ring gave us a tighter center and a more tidy finish.

No, it doesn't defeat the purpose of the technique, there are still two loops inside the Adjustable Ring and that is about the number of times we run the Tail around the center of the first round when we weave in the ends with a yarn needle. So… neat and tidy, easier to execute, same results. Done and done! Moving on…

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15. And the hands are back! Hurray for the hands. Hey… maybe I can get some part-time gigs as a hand model… okay… maybe a plus-size/pudgy hand model. There might be a market for that, right??

This time we are tightening up the loops to CLOSE the center of our Adjustable Ring.

Holding the Tail in the fingers of my left hand, I put the Tail between the first and second fingers of my right hand and close those fingers. With the right side of my finished round of stitches facing me and bracing the finished round and Adjustable Ring against my two closed fingers, I gently pull the Tail until the center is closed nice and tight. Or as tight as you want it to be closed… again, some patterns call for an open center as in certain motifs. However, if you are making a hat or the toe of a sock, you're going to want to close that center ring securely.

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16. And here's a LOVELY shot of that closed up ring. Isn't it a beautiful thing?


Note the Tail coming from the lower left side of the finished center round and the Working Yarn coming from the left side of the last Single Crochet stitch made.

From here, you can continue to work in the round, in a spiral, in turning rounds… you get the idea… you're good to go!

TAADAA!!
(Because life needs more fanfares…)

A Few Final Words
Like we said earlier, there are parts of the Adjustable Ring technique that are, at first, a bit fiddly and can take a little practice to master and execute smoothly. As a matter of fact, this is a major component to a few of our classes and it usually takes folks a while before they feel confident about producing a neat and tidy first round with their Adjustable Ring.

Be patient, practice, and compare your work with the photos in this tutorial. You will get it and be using the Adjustable Ring when you work your next crochet project in the round in no time! And… hey… if you aren't happy rip it out and go again! You'll get it!

Also, do experiment with different yarn weights, with yarns spun differently, different stitches, and with different hook sizes. You will definitely find that different yarns and different crochet stitches in your first round will make the Adjustable part of the Adjustable Ring more or less easy to execute. 

Thanks for dropping by for another Technique Tuesday! Our aim is to build the skillz of our FAB fiber community here on the web and it's always FAB to hear from you all that what we are doing is helping you and your fiber friends.

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Stitch On!
S&J

Oh hey… before you go… Here are a few more pages we thought you might be interested in. Click on any of the photos below… enjoy!

Crochet Ribbing Tutorial

How To Add New Yarn Mid-Row

FAB Patterns!

A Sneak Peek at our NEW Book!

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