A simple crochet potholder with a thick and lovely bubbly pattern. Simple to make but also beautiful and handy result.

Before you begin

Abbreviations

• SC: Single crochet (American term, see here for difference between British and American terms)
• BS: Bubble stitch

Turning chain

Just to avoid any confusion, I make it clear here, that every new row starts with a turning chain.

Yarn type

Choose a yarn that isn’t sensitive to heat. So not something like acrylic materials.

For reference, mine are made from cotton, and has no issue with handling the heat of warm items from the oven.

Bubble mask

You start just like with a double crochet:

1. Loop around the hook
2. Put the hook through the next stitch
3. Loop around the hook
4. Pull through so you have 3 loops on the needle (a)
5. Loop around the hook
6. Pull through 2 of the loops

Then instead of pulling through the last 2 loops (b), you instead repeat these 6 steps 3 more times so you end up with 5 loops on the hook (c).

Then you loop around 1 last time and pull that one through all 5 loops (d).

Recipe

We are going to make 2 squares and then afterwards sew/crochet them together, to create a thick potholder with a bubble pattern on each side.

The square

The square consists of 20 x 16 bubbles with a thin border around it.

0. Make 44 chains
1. SC into the second chain and continue out
2. 43 SC
3-34.
-> Odd rows: 2 SC, (BS, SC) x 20, SC
-> Even rows: 43 SC
35. 43 SC

Remember to make 1 more before moving on.

Putting it together

Washing and stretching

To get the best result you are going to wash the squares, according to the yarn type, and stretch it out:

Let it dry completely before moving on to sewing.

By the way, knitting blocks are nice to have. Before I had them, I used an ironing board, but that didn’t work out so well.

Sewing

We are sewing inside out, so put the 2 pieces together, with the bubbles touching each other:

You will then either perform single crochets or sew with yarn and needle around the edges. Except one of the smaller edges, so we can turn it inside out:

Then we turn it inside out and crochet/sew the last edge from the outside.

And you are done:

Conclusion

You now have a beautiful and handy potholder.

My suggestion is to make another one so you have a pair. It makes it easier to get things out of the oven, when you can use both hands 😉

For more crochet related content, you can go here.