Can't understand pattern!

[Lynn Chambers]

Hi everyone, I'm in the middle of doing an amigurumi elephant's feet and the pattern is asking me to chain 7 and start in the second chain from hook then says "spiral round" Round 1 says 5sc inc 5sc.  I'm totally confused as to how to do that Please help lol.

[Granny Square]

Hi, and  again!  (Just FYI, you posted this twice which is OK, but the other section is to welcome newcomers which may be why you so far have only gotten "Hello and welcome!" on your other thread.  This section is for help on patterns & techniques.  No biggie, just helping to orient you to our forum.

I believe what is is trying to tell you is to work in an oval around the chain, the concept is you work across the chain more or less as usual, but then it gets weird:  in the case of your pattern, you return back to where you started by working into the loop or loops you didn't use in the first pass.  Questions on this concept are the ones that come up most often in the Help section I think; mostly this idea is used with increases to make flat ovals (example like a placemat), but in your case your foot isn't going to be flat, more like a closed tube . 

So if you chain 7, skip the first chain, sc in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th,  5th and 6th chain from the hook , you have 5made 5 SC and have 1 chain remaining in front of you, right?  Increase into that next chain - this turns the corner.  

What the pattern is telling you at this point is to sc back to where you started from, using the loops that were on the underside of the chain you did not use before.  My personal opinion: when you are working in an oval like this, I do not recommend using the back bump of the chain for the first pass, it pulls the chain too tight to work in this situation when you are making 2 passes like this.  With the chain facing you, either stick your hook the top loop + the back loop (which leaves 1 loop remaining for the second pass), or under the top loop on the first pass and the other 2 loops on the second pass (the second pass is what I choose, because I typically work into just the top loop of a chain whatever I'm making).

If this is really confusing trying to make sense of what I wrote, (and I get it, it IS rather odd) there are a lot of youtube videos showing the concept in general that might be helpful.  You will end up with more or less an oval 'bag' shape for the foot.  A lot of tote bag patterns start this way, so you don't have to sew or crochet 2 pieces together.

 

 

Edited July 9 by Granny Square