I’ll be doing all my demonstrating using guides only. I tend to prefer only guides for a few reasons and they’re unique to me, I suppose. I find that grids get in my way. I have a hard time focusing on what I’m creating if there’s a bunch of blue and grey lines running all over the screen. Secondly, sometimes a grid just doesn’t work. Sometimes the stitches I’m trying to line up need to change in size for every row and sometimes it’s not consistent. In these situations, the grid is useless to me. So I tend to just design using guides only. Grids are, however, really good for doing schematics and I tend to use them for that, at least on the outset anyways.

Get Your Ducks in a Row

Let’s make a chart with a line of chain stitches, where Row 1 is single crochet, Row 2 is double crochet, and Row 3 is treble crochet. To do this, we need to set up Smart Guides. Smart Guides will help you align stitches next to one another so that their centers line up evenly. When lining up one stitch next to another, you should feel the second stitch is magnetically attracted to the first as it tries to line up with it. This will save you loads of time in your designing.

Hit COMMAND + U (Or go to View –>> Smart Guides) to set up Smart Guides.

Now drag a horizontal guide down from the ruler above your workspace. Drop it towards the lower 2/3rds of the workspace. This will be the guide for our row of chain stitches.

Click on the Selection Tool   on the toolbar.

Start out by copy/pasting (COMMAND + C on a MAC) a chain stitch from the document from Part 1 of this series (here on out referred to as your “legend”). Now, zoom in so we can see it closer. To zoom in a certain percentage, look in the bottom, left corner of the workspace. You can either type in a number or click the drop down for a bunch of presets. How much you zoom in is up to you.

Hover your pointer over the center of the stitch. You should see “center” in blue words. Now click on the center and drag the chain stitch onto the guide you made. Don’t drop it down until you see the word, “path” in blue. This tells you that the chain stitch is intersecting the guide you just created. You should feel the stitch wanting to pull slightly towards the guide. This is called, “snap to guide(s).” When you release the left mouse button to drop it, you should see the word, “intersect” in blue. Bingo, it’s in place.

Now, using the marquee method mentioned in the last tutorial, highlight both of these stitches, then copy and paste two more into the document. Now you should have four chains. Align these two to the guide. Even though there are two stitches, you can click the center of one of them and move them simultaneously, so long as they’re still selected. Keep doing this until you have 8 chain stitches in total.

Now, let’s highlight each one of these stitches individually and create vertical guides in the centers of each. So, use the marquee method to highlight one at a time then drag and drop a guide on each. You’ll see the words, “align 90 degrees” in blue appear as you’re doing this. You might also see “center” if your pointer happens to be in the center of the stitch. Either is perfect.

Go back to your “stitch legend” document and copy/paste in your single crochet stitch (“SC”). Align the SC with one of the vertical guides. Once in place, use the up and down directional keys on the keyboard to inch it into place vertically. Try to leave a little space between the SC and the chain stitches. Once in place, make a horizontal guide across the middle of the SC stitch.

Continue placing the SC stitches in place. Use the marquee method to select groups of SC stitches and paste them into place quickly.

Repeat the directions for the double and treble crochet stitches, lining them up to the guides you’ve set in place. With stitches like DC’s and the like which are not symmetrical like chains and SC’s, I usually set the guide for these on the top, horizontal line. 

When you’re done go to View –>> Guides –>> Clear Guides to get rid of the guides for good. If you just want to hide them, there’s an option in that same drop down menu to hide them for as long as you like. 

I’d like to point out something that I do without thought, something that will (might) help you in terms of your work habits. When I paste a group of stitches into the layout, I instantly click the keyboard function to “group” them together (COMMAND + G). That way, when I move them into place, I don’t accidently leave a stitch, or a part of a stitch out. Having done this before and not realized it until later, it can sometimes be a pain to realize this after the fact, especially when you’ve already published your chart to the internet or sent it off to a publisher. So, take my advice, it helps to “group” groups of stitches, move them into place, and then if you need to work with them individually, you can ungroup them once they’re moved. 

Hopefully now you’re on your way to making some basic stitch diagrams, with basic being the operative word. In the next part of this series, I’ll show you some tips and tricks on how to make more unordinary stitches. I’ll be focusing on stitches that require the Transform Tool, stitches like Fans, Shells, and Decreases. 

If this has helped you in any way, feel free to leave a comment. I’m unsure who my audience is at the moment.