Complete beginner need help understanding patterns

[MrsHobbs]

Hi! my husband bought me a crochet kit (make your own dobby) thinking it would be for beginners. I am stumped already! It says the following to make the ears:

row 1: ch 7

rows 2-5: ch 1, dc 7(7)

 

I understand that row 1 wants me to make 7chains, I have no idea what the rest means! Can someone please help a girl out!

[Granny Square]

Welcome to the 'ville and to crochet!  Dobby was one of my favorite HP characters   I am guessing you are in the UK, because of the ch 1, DC (the UK and US use different terms for the same stitch, but a UK is the same as  a US DC -- which 1 chain for a turning chain.

First of all, that is oddly (but not wrongly worded), but I'll 'translate'.  First, to get the very last thing you typed out of the way, (7) is a sanity check summary - it is telling you that you should have 7 stitches at the end of a row (it's more helpful for a longer row, but it's nice your pattern has this feature, not all do.

Second,  Usually the initial chain doesn't count as a row.  Let me re-word this, it says the same thing  -- does this make more sense? 

row 1: ch 8, dc in the second chain from hook and remaining 6 chains (7)

row 2: ch 1, dc 7(7)

rows 3-5: repeat row 2

(the reason for chain 8, not chain 1, in row 1 - notice row 1 originally said ch 7, then row 2 started with ch 1?  That's 8 chains in a row, so I've 'said' the same thing and the chain + row 1 would be more typically worded the way I did - the initial chain usually isn't it's own row, it's part of row 1.)

Edited June 5, 2020 by Granny Square