You are twelve rounds into an amigurumi head, the phone rings, and when you look back down you have no idea where the round began. Everyone who crochets or knits has been there, and the fix costs less than a ball of good yarn.
A stitch marker is a small clip or ring that holds your place. It is the least glamorous tool in the bag and the one experienced makers refuse to work without, because it turns counting from a memory test into a glance.
Two kinds of marker
Locking markers
Small clips that open and close like a safety pin. They fasten into the stitch itself, so they stay in the fabric for as many rows as you like. These work for both crochet and knitting.
Ring markers
Closed rings that sit on a knitting needle between two stitches and get slipped across each row. They are for knitting only, and they mark the row you are on.
If you crochet, buy locking markers
Crochet has no needle for a ring to sit on, so a ring marker is no use to you. A locking marker clips straight into the stitch. Knitters can use either, which is why locking markers are the ones to own first.
The everyday choice
Prym Stitch Markers, pack of 21
KES 1,300
Twenty-one small plastic clips that snap shut onto a stitch and stay there. That is enough to mark the start of a round, every increase on a sleeve and a pattern repeat or two, all in the same project, with spares for the ones that end up down the side of the sofa.
Locking · 21 in a pack · For crochet and knitting
See Prym stitch markers
The upgrade
Clover Quick Locking Stitch Marker Set
KES 3,100
A mix of sizes and colours in their own case, made to open and close with one hand so you never have to put your work down. The different sizes mean you have a marker for fine yarn and one for chunky.
Quick locking · Assorted sizes and colours · Storage case
See the Clover setSeven ways to use them
Mark the start of a round. Clip a marker into the first stitch of every round and move it up as you go. This is the one that saves amigurumi.
Mark increases and decreases. A marker at each shaping point means you never have to count across the row to find it.
Count a long starting chain. Place a marker every 20 chains and a foundation of 180 becomes nine easy checks.
Keep edges straight. Mark the first and last stitch of each row and you will stop losing or gaining stitches at the sides of a blanket.
Count rows. Clip one in every tenth row and you can tell how far you have come at a glance.
Hold your work. Put the live crochet loop on a marker when you stop and it cannot unravel in your bag.
Pin pieces together. Use them like tiny pegs to hold a sleeve or a toy limb in position while you sew it on.
A simple colour system
Give each colour one job and keep to it across every project: say one colour for the start of the round, a second for increases and a third for decreases. After a week you will read your own knitting or crochet (or crotchet, as plenty of us write it) without looking at the pattern.
Making toys? Our safety eyes start at KES 50, and our guide to the best yarn for amigurumi covers the rest.
Add a pack to your next order
Stitch markers are small, so we keep them by the hooks and needles at our shop on the 1st floor of Sarit Centre.
Shop knitting and crochet accessoriesOr call us on +254 798 316860
In Stitches is the authorised Prym and Clover distributor in Kenya.
Prices correct at the time of writing.
