Filet Crochet Is Easier Than You Think

I am an avid crocheter. I love making up new patterns or following a tried and tested pattern from the internet. I don't buy pattern books anymore because there are so many free crochet patterns online. Without the huge online crocheting community, I wouldn't be at the level I am at now.

I have always been intimidated by filet crochet. I don't know. Maybe because it all just looks so complicated. I finally made myself try it. I found a really cute pattern online for my first one. I feel awful because I didn't bookmark it and don't remember what the name of the site was. So, I'm not posting a pattern for it. I didn't have the size 20 cotton thread that it called for, so instead of it being a book mark...it's a table runner. Nice, right? That's how I roll.

This is the finished project.

From what I've seen, you can only find filet crochet patterns in chart form. I, again, was a little scared at first but it turns out that the charts are really easy to read. If the square is black, you make a solid mesh of dc's. If it is white, you leave an open mesh with a ch-2 (chain 2) and a dc (double crochet). My second filet crochet pattern was more involved, but not a bit more difficult than my oversized bookmark.

Here are some in progress pictures.

Drum Roll Please....The finished project!

The pattern I used for this runner came from Granny's Garret. I made quite a few changes to it. One of which was the number of dc's (double crochets) per mesh. The pattern called for a 4 dc mesh, but I changed it to a 3 dc mesh. I wanted to use it on one of my coffee tables, and thought the 3 dc mesh would look much cooler against the black of the coffee table. That involved changing the whole pattern. I changed the starting row to 81 and simply followed the chart. I just skipped over about 90% of it because it would have been enormous. This turned out to be a good size for what I wanted to use it for, so I was happy with it. I also added a few open meshes to the middle because it looked a little too cramped. I love how this turned out.

I wish I had learned how to do filet crochet sooner. Looking back, I don't know why I was so scared to try it. From now on, I'm just going to go for it. I mean, the worst that can happen is I mess up, right? And I can always just unravel the mistake. Ah...the beauty of crochet.