Hints for reducing pattern size?

[Rosesandtea]

Hi, I have a pattern I'd like to do, but with 2 strands of yarn and a 12 mm or a Q hook. The pattern as it is, is too big (wide) anyway - it's supposed to be 48 inches wide. I want to make an afghan or throw for my 2 yr old daughter. So I'm thinking about 40 inches wide. Maybe 45 by 45 total.

The pattern is just with one strand of yarn.

 

My question is, how do you figure how many reps are truly there, so that when you do the second and third rows, you won't get messed up? Is there a handy formula?

 

I'm hoping to get this done by Christmas! along with finishing my ds's afghan (almost there, just doing the finishing rounds of Glacier (like fake fur) on the edges - dd's will have that too).

and almost done with the 26 coasters for SS teachers....... :*cgift whew!

 

thanks for any advice

Karen

rosesandtea.blogdrive.com

[mc_crochets]

I'm not certain myself, but you might want to link to the pattern so that we can see what it is you want to reduce, as different patterns have different size repetitions

[Rosesandtea]

thanks mommiechickie, it's in a book. I'm not sure what I'm allowed to copy of it- still feeling my way around such things! I'll see about getting back to posting the name of the book!

:w-flake

~Karen

[Rosesandtea]

I drew myself a graph. I used - more or less - int'l crochet symbols. I made a line of ch stitches, that I could add to. Then I looked at the next row, and drew the stitches, and noticed what I was repeating, (I didn't draw all the repeating bits, as it was straightforward) and made sure I had the right number of stitches at the end, and drew what I was supposed to do. So, in my example, I noticed I needed 7 stitches to begin with before the repeating pattern stitches, and the repeats had 8 stitches in them. So I chained 7, and then continued in lots of 8's, until it was the width I thought it should be. Then I put in the chains for the end bit.

 

I don't know how clear this explanation was, I guess the main point is that drawing a graph helped me count what I needed for my starting chain. Perhaps this will help someone else who needs visuals too. )

 

:coffeeteachoc

~Karen