Errors in Patterns

I was working up a new square from "200 Crochet Blocks..." on Monday when I realised it was happening again. The pattern was misleading me.



I'd just finished working up #2: Tiny Textures, and had moved onto #10: Openwork Square. Straight away, there was something different. #10 starts with ch 34. #2? ch 32. That might not be too bad, I can hear you thinking. #10 might begin with a row 1 of TR & #2 might have begun with DC. Except it didn't. Both squares started off with a foundation row of double crochet. Which meant that by the end of it, #2 Tiny Textures had a base row of 31 and #10 Openwork Square had a base row of 33.

In any given world, if you work up these squares with the SAME yarn and the SAME hook, the square that has a base width of 33 stitches is GOING to be bigger than the square with a base width of 31.

Look:

The completed square is the one I featured on Monday: #2: Tiny Textures. The beginning-as-yet-unmade-square strip featured is the beginning of #10: Openwork Square. It's only up to row2, which means I've worked the 34 ch, turned, worked dc's along & ended up with 33dc. Then I worked row 1 (the treble lacey row) & row 2, which is where I really ran into the ... trouble.

Row 2 reads thus: 1ch, 1dc into first tr, 2dc into each 1ch sp along row, ending with 2dc into 1ch sp formed by turning ch, turn (33dc).

Which would work, if row 1 hadn't read like this: 4ch (counts as 1tr, 1ch), miss 1dc, tr into next dc *1ch, missing 1dc, 1tr into next dc; rep from * to end, turn.

The little pattern repeats itself along and works itself over 2dc's of the previous row. (1tr, ch1 missing a dc.) Row 2 has you working 3 (THREE) stitches into each of the 2dc space of that foundation row. This means you end up with a count that looks like this:

See how much LONGER the 33dc wide strip became with row 2? It ended up being 44dc wide with those extra dc's added in.

This is WHY, when you work up a new pattern or square, you do a quick trial run first. Does the square work up correctly? Is it the same size as the other one? I've talked about this before, last year when I posted about "blocks that should match, but don't" funnily enough about a few other blocks from 200 Crochet Blocks. It's not that this block is incorrect - in fact it's perfectly fine. It's just that it's size in relation to other blocks is different. If you make it up before hand and notice this sort of size error, it's then relatively easy to adjust the pattern to fit your other squares.

This book is terrific. I can't recommend it enough to people who like to crochet, and especially to learners. But don't open the book and expect to be able to work up every block to the same size. It's not going to happen. The best of intentions can sometime backfire, and even experts like Jan Eaton can sometimes end up with errors in their work.