Posted on 10 Comments

Weaving in ends

02 hexagons

Another week, another hexagon blanket update! How is yours coming along? As of Friday night, I had met my goal of doubling the number of hexagons I’d joined. I got it up to 36. I spent Saturday getting 18 more hexagons all done (except for their joining rounds), and I plan to spend the rest of the week attaching them to the blanket.

I thought this week I’d show you how I weave in my ends.

This is not my favorite part of the task, and to be completely honest, I am always nervous that I may not have done a good enough job. I can’t think about tossing my blankets into the washing machine without also envisioning them emerging as a pile of unraveled yarn. That’s a bit overdramatic, I know, but nobody has ever accused me of being level-headed about these things!

I weave in ends as soon as I have joined a hexagon to the rest of the blanket. If I left them all to the end, I’d find some way to justify leaving them dangling there in some kind of “shaggy blanket” design that would be fooling no one but myself. No, better to do them one at a time, as they are joined.

27 ends 01

Start in the center. This end is my favorite to deal with. Why? Well, mainly it’s because I crocheted around it already as I was working the first round, so it’s already probably fairly secure. Any further weaving is just for backup.

Thread the end onto a yarn needle, and insert the needle through about half of the loops of the inner circle. Pull the end through all the way. Repeat using the rest of the loops of the inner circle. Trim the end.

27 ends 02

I like to do the next two ends (light color and medium color) together, since they are right next to each other anyway.

Thread the two ends together onto the yarn needle, and pass the needle through the medium blue stitches on the corner, hooking the needle behind a light blue stitch on the way.

Turn the needle around, and pass it back through the medium blue corner stitches, skipping the first stitch on the way through (this is to keep it from un-doing the previous pass.)

Once again, turn the needle around, and pass it through the medium blue corner stitches, skipping the first stitch on the way through. Cut the yarn here.

(Sometimes, instead of skipping the first stitch in the corner cluster, I hook my needle around one of the light blue stitches right next to the medium blue cluster. It doesn’t really matter, as long as you give the ends something to hang on to as they turn around and go back through the cluster.)

27 ends 03

The medium and dark pair of ends are handled exactly the same way as the previous pair.  Your ends are likely to be further away from a corner, so you’ll have to thread them through a few extra spots before reaching the dark blue corner cluster and starting the weaving process.

The last remaining end is just a single dark blue end, and you can thread it down through a few stitches to reach the dark blue corner and start the weaving process. I often use the same corner as I did for the medium/dark pair. I feel like all of those ends getting tangled up together out of sight adds some extra security. (Although, it’s probably all in my head.)

27 ends 04

So! If you have another method you’d like to share, please do so. Maybe you know some handy tips that I don’t. Remember, I haven’t been crocheting all that long, and I’m largely self-taught. While I have got the granny square thing down pat at this point, there are still other techniques at which I am far from expert level.

Feel free to educate me in the comments 🙂

Good luck with your blanket progress this week! Oh, and I made us a button. feel free to grab it for your blog and invite others to join!

Next week: I have nothing planned – any topics you’d like me to cover?

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Posted on 10 Comments

10 thoughts on “Weaving in ends

  1. Very timely post– I have been teaching a couple of gals how to crochet and have been mean about not letting them just snip off those ends 🙂

    1. And good thing, too. Imagine what an unraveled mess they’d have not too long down the line. Ack.

  2. Lisa this is almost exactly how I weave in ends. And just like you I’m always worried I haven’t done a secure enough job. But really, is there any other way?

    I’m joining my third row of hexagons this week. Progress feels so delightful!

    1. No, there probably isn’t any other way, at least with stitch patterns like these that are full of gaps. Crocheting over ends seems to be the best way to handle them, but you just can’t do that with granny squares.

  3. I feel the exact same way! I am so nervous that when someone actually uses the item I’ve made that EVERY SINGLE END will suddenly appear and make it look like a crazy bad haircut. 🙂 So stressful. But your tutorial helps! Thanks so much!

    1. You’re welcome 🙂 I guess we all have that fear. It probably comes with the territory when you spend 2 months making something!

  4. […] in ends. We were just talking about this in regards to our blanket crochet-along, so it’s a pretty timely topic. Mercedes weaves her […]

  5. Thanks for sharing this topic! After weaving my ends, they just seem to pop out at the very end. I snip off the little tail and it pokes out at the next ending place. I give most of my projects as gifts and I’m afraid after they wash them, all the ends will be coming undone.
    I also love that you actually answer the questions that are asked. Even if the comment isn’t a question, you comment back. I am a new follower of your blog. It is a wonderful place to learn and I just love it!

    1. Thank you so much, Leslie, it is great to get a little feedback 🙂
      It’s funny, I am always afraid my ends are going to come undone, but when I was working on my most recent blanket, I actually had to take apart 12 motifs, and they were *such* a pain in the neck to get apart, mainly because of the woven in ends. So, I feel a lot better about them now 🙂
      Glad you dropped by – hope you stick around!

      1. I surely will! Thanks.

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