The Quick Shell Stitch: A Crochet Tutorial

March 17, 2017

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Happy St. Patrick’s Day friends! Here we are at Friday again… do you know what that means? Yes, you guessed it, time to learn a new stitch.

Looking through stitches, trying to decide what to share with you all has been so fun and inspiring. My project idea list has grown so much. I can’t wait to get started on it and share some new designs with you.

If you want to see the stitches from weeks 1 and 2 you can find them Here or Here

How’s your week been? The time change threw a big wrench in mine… lots of coffee was consumed in the making of this blog post haha. I considered calling my mom, who is a Registered Nurse, and seeing if she would be willing to make the 4 hour drive to my house to start me on a coffee IV. Ultimately, I decided against it because what kind of quack doctor could I get to write an order for that?

I did sign my middle daughter up for Kindergarten this week! Next year it will be just me and the baby (2 and half is still a baby, right??) home all day. Exciting and bittersweet all at the same time. Sometimes I want them to stay little forever. They gave me a questionnaire to fill out about my kid and most of it was just yes and no questions. Then at the end it there were 3 questions that required a written answer.

What is most pleasing to you about your child? Well, she’s my kid so pretty much everything.
What is most challenging about your child? Well, she’s my kid, so pretty much everything
What form of discipline works best for your child? Discipline? What is that?

I should say, these were not my actual answers but when your filling out paperwork at 6am, these are things you actually consider writing.

Ok enough rambling…obviously, the caffeine is kicking in.

The Quick Shell Stitch

*This post may contain affiliate links. If you click through and make a purchase I receive a small commission. That money helps me maintain my site so I can continue to share my patterns and tutorials with you for free.

The Quick Shell Stitch pattern is achieved by working a row of 3 double crochet shells over a row of chain stitches. This creates an overall fabric with little eyelets in it. I think this stitch would suit a variety of different yarn weights and projects. Hats, blankets, scarves, market bags, baby items…. the list goes on. This stitch would lend itself well to stripes or color blocks, just make your color change at the end of a “shell row.”

When working your foundation chains, I suggest either going up at least a half a hook size or making sure your chains are very loose. I found that when I used the same hook size throughout, the bottom of my piece was too tight and make my swatch look a little wonky.

Materials

For this tutorial I used a #4 Worsted Weight Yarn…. Caron Simply Soft in the color Strawberry to be specific.
5 mm and 5.5 mm hook
Please feel free to pick whatever yarn weight and hook combo you want.

Abbreviations

Ch(s): chain(s)
Sc: single crochet
Sk: skip
Dc: double crochet
St(s): stitch(es)
Sp: space

Stitch Instructions

Using the bigger hook ( I used a 5.5mm), chain a multiple of 3 +2 more chains. I chained 26.

Row 1: Switch to your smaller hook (I used a 5mm). Sc in 2^nd ch from hook. *Ch 3, skip 2 chs, sc in next, repeat from * across. Turn.

Row 2: This will be considered the Right Side of your piece. Ch 3, (counts as 1 dc here and throughout). Dc in Same st as ch 3. Sc in ch 3 sp, * 3 dc in next sc, sc in next ch 3 sp. Repeat from * across. 2 dc in last sc. Turn.

Row 3: Ch 1. Sc in same st as ch 1. * Ch 3, sk next 3 sts, sc in next (this will be the middle dc of shell from previous row). Repeat from * across, placing your last sc in top of turning ch 3. Turn

Repeat rows 2 and 3 until your piece is desired size.

Want to purchase supplies I used in today’s tutorial? Start here (affiliate link):

What are you going to make with the Quick Shell Stitch? I already have an idea what I’m going to do with it but you’ll have to wait and see. I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Don’t forget to share your projects with me on Facebook or you can use #theunraveledmitten on Instagram.