Bullion Stitch HEEEEEEELP

[dhaunae]

Bonnie Pierce makes incredibly beautiful squares and uses this stitch profligately, and I swear she must have made a deal with the devil because damnit I cannot get this to work right. I can get the little roly-poly worm shapes (well, kinda cornucopia shapes actually) pretty well, but what the **** is the trick to getting them a certain size? I CANNOT get a bullion with 15 wraps to come out 1" long. Cannot. The smallest I can get mine are about 1.5". If I wrap the yarn any tighter I'll have to use a blowtorch to get it off my hook, so I don't think that's the answer; I'm just stumped. Instead of a neat little flower shape I end up with a cute little pumpkin shape mounded up above the center of my square. Quite fetching, but not what I was aiming for. So how do you get a 1" bullion? Or a 2" bullion if that's what you want?

 

Second of all, the stitch looks really pretty on the front of the square, and the back, to be blunt, looks like hell. It has long threads behind the bullions. And loopy thingies at the top of the bullions (yes, loopy thingy is a technical term here, no offense to darling Loopi intended). I take a lot of pride in my work looking good front and back, so this offends me. Is there a way around it, or is it just a function of this stitch that I'll have to live with, or am I doing something funky and amazingly wrong here?

 

The square I'm working on, btw, is http://members.aol.com/gandal195/irishivyrose.html. Please notice that she suggests as an alternative the "Pretty Punkin" square. See how that pretty punkin is all pooched up? Yeah. Mine too. Only mine isn't orange. Please help me before I give up and just call mine the "Pretty Squash" square, since it's yellow.

[crochetfun]

I have not done this one, so this is just a thought:

 

what about using a smaller hook, or switching to a smaller hook just for the bullions?

[Keiyla]

If it's one of these, there are videos:

 

http://www.stitchguide.com/stitches/crochet/stitch_pages/crochetonaroll.html

[TepperWear]

Well, for one thing, it says size G hook. Well, I have a size G6 and a size G7. I don't get why that is, but maybe you're not really using the size that's suggested. Also, it does say to use whatever size needed to get the gauge, so maybe trying another hook would help. and one more thought, what if you just did less wraps around the hook. Good luck. I've tried making them too, and couldn't get it all.

[Alosha]

You have my complete sympathy. I was working on a free form piece & after seeing some of Bonnie's work, decided to incorporate the bullion stitch. That stitch had me using words that even shocked my cats.

I'm afraid I can't be much help since I'm still struggling with it. That long thread behind the stitch is just the nature of the beast-sorry.

Besides, I think the crochet world could use a "pretty squash" square.

Alosha

[dhaunae]

What's annoying is my bullions LOOK good, they're fairly even and although the stitch is a PITA once I got the hang of it it's not really hard to do, except for the size. I'm on gauge with the square itself using a G6 (I did think of that actually); if anything it's going to come out a little smaller than 6" as most of her stuff seems to for me, I almost always need to add a row of single or half-double to make 6". I did try dropping to an F hook for the bullions early on and still got bullions that were too long, which is why I was thinking maybe there's some trick I don't know to this. I didn't try using less wraps, though, since she specifically called for 15; that's a good idea. I'll try it again doing that and see what happens.

 

In the meantime I'm finishing the Squash Square using the most garishly bright colors I could find. If it wants to be a mutant square, who am I to stand in its way? Maybe someday someone will make an Uglyghan again ... I've got the perfect contribution if so! And at least the long stringy reverse of the squash is normal. That's good to know. Kind of. *hehe*

[Layna]

GO TO THE POST KEIYLA ABOVE GAVE STITCH GUIDE THEY HAVE GREAT VIDEOS ON HOW TO DO STITCHES JUST WATCH VIDEO OVER AND OVER YOU WILL GET THE STITCHES. AND THE STICH YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT THE BULLION IS ALSO KNOWN AS THE ROLL STITCH AND YOU CAN MAKE IT ANY SIZE YOU WANT I WOULD SAY USING AT LEAST 5 ROLL OVERS ONTO THE HOOK.

[Keiyla]

Maybe use a larger hook, or wrap the yarn looser? If it's too tight, it seems the yarn would stack on top of each other, wheras looser loops might sort of hang over each other, allowing a shorter roll.

[mythunderbird]

annies attic use to have hooks just made for the bullion stitch, i am not sure if they still do, but they might, is kind of a hard stitch for someone who don'tknow how, and is not so easy to learn if you have the wrong hook. hope you get it cause it is a fun stitch, and very elegant looking. hugs

[mythunderbird]

i just checked and they still have them, but call them the roll stitch hook combo, 3 hooks different sizes for 7.99, not bad at all www.anniesattic.com

hugs

[dhaunae]

I understand how to do the stitch; it comes out beautiful and even, and it's not particularly hard to do. It just comes out too long. In this pattern she specifically calls for 15 wraps; I'm going to try it with just 10 and see if it works to a more appropriate length.

[Stacey]

yes, loopy thingy is a technical term here

Fair enough In my last thread in this section I kept using "pointy bits" as a technical term!

 

That's exactly what I was going to say, to try fewer wraps since everything else is coming out okay. I just recently learned bullions, too, and I had the worst time with them at first, kept getting the hook stuck halfway through (I think I was wrapping the yarn too tight).

[dhaunae]

Yeah that was my biggest problem at first too, Stacey, I kept wrapping too tightly (even though she SAYS wrap evenly but loosely). Once I figured the tension thing out though it was like a lightbulb going on; I can even make bullion stitches fairly quickly. Now if I can just get the size right! I tried a 10-wrap and it's the right length (yay!) but not as ... dense? Is dense the right word? It doesn't look right for this square, anyway. The little roly-poly isn't as thick and rich looking as it should be. I'm going to keep messing with this though, because I do like how the stitch looks and I feel like I'm making at least some progress now.

[The Shrone]

I've had the good fortune of meeting Bonnie Pierce in person a couple of times. She's a great, fun lady and when I first tried the stitch it was a challenge to get it to come out right. I showed her my first attempts and she encouraged me to keep trying, keep trying, because practice and experimentation makes perfect.

 

The secret for me wasn't so much using the right sized hook because you can make boullions using thread (in fact I found it easier to make them in thread!) but rather yarn tension. Once I got the right tension across the wraps my rolls started to take a better shape.

 

It's like making the spirals from Patricia Kristoffersen's patterns---tension, practice and patience.

 

What's amazing about Bonnie is she crochet's using only one hand! She's like a machine! You don't want to watch her make a boullion because her one-hand technique only serves to confuse and confound! She laughs merrily away while making her bouillions and if you ask her to slow down it just doesn't help any! She's truly a crocheting wonder!

 

One little help that Bonnie did give me about the stitch is that it helps to massage the bouillions into shape if needed. Her's also had funny strings and appearance on the wrong side. It's the nature of the stitch so don't worry about the wrong side looking "wrong". It's gonna look that way.

 

~ Lori