Transcript for:
Creating a Cozy Moses Basket Tutorial

Hello! Welcome to my channel. My name is Kristen and I'm the maker behind Yarn Theory.

Today I am bringing you the updated tutorial for the Moses Basket project. All of the materials that I'll mention in the video today will be listed and linked in the description box below so make sure you check that out. And now we'll review the materials. One of the most important parts of this project is your wooden base.

The base I have today has 110 holes and is about 29 and a half inches long and 16 inches wide and about six millimeters thick. The holes on this base are 12 millimeters in diameter with 10 millimeters of space in between them. And for those of you who are interested, I will be putting this information in the description box too that you can reference it later.

And don't worry if your base isn't the same shape as mine, you will still be able to complete your project by following the same instructions. The fiber that we're using today is the 9mm braided cotton cord from the brand Bobini. I use this in a lot of my projects because I love the quality and it comes in a variety of colors, so you have tons of options.

I also use it in a lot of my home decor projects and wearable accessories as well. So this is the color nude. I'm going to use this in a lot of my projects because I love the quality and it comes in a variety of colors. And each bundle comes with 100 meters of cord, which is about 108 yards.

If you're making the basic bassinet, you will only need three bundles. And if you are making the hooded version, you will need four. And just a quick note, this project can get a little pricey when you total up the cost of these supplies. So I want you to keep that in mind if you're planning to take this on. If you total up the cost of the cord I have here, and the base itself this is about 150 worth of supplies and this does not include the cost of shipping so just keep that in mind as you're planning for a project like this so there's no surprises next up we have our crochet hook.

This time around I'm using a 9mm hook. Knot Pictured is a smaller hook as well. You'll need to have, I use a 8mm hook for my smaller hook. Of course you'll need a pair of scissors, a tape measure, and some stitch markers. I used about 7 total, you'll need the locking stitch markers.

And that's about it. So gather your supplies and once you have all of that, you can come back. and we can get right into the project the setup round is optional this is just a design choice that I think adds a nice refined element to your bassinet and it will help to close up the holes a little bit more grab your cord and you're not millimeter hook and we're going to start on one of the shorter sides of your base locate your center stitch and then you will attach your cord by inserting your hook from the top to the bottom and pulling your cord through don't worry if you're struggling a little bit depending on the size of your holes this may be a little tougher and you may need to put a little bit of effort in to get the cord through what we're going to do now is slip stitch into each hole around the perimeter of our base and the side that you see here that creates this beautiful braided design will be the bottom of our base and once we complete all of our slips stitches i'll show you what it looks like on the other side which is the inside of our bassinet Okay, so once you're done, you should have something that looks like this. And I'm going to slide it into frame so you can see the entire base.

And our slip stitches look really nice. They create this nice braided design, and they completely cover up the holes from the bottom so you won't be able to see them which is what i was going for and so now we need to finish this round by doing one final slip stitch back into the hole where we joined our cord but as you can see i'm unable to fit my hook in there now so i'm going to switch to the eight millimeter hook and this will allow me to get my hook in there and pull up one more loop and close that off with a slip stitch And so we have completed our setup round and now I'm going to show you what this looks like on the other side. So this is our bottom once again, and then if you flip it over, you'll see the inside of our base, which... It also has a nice design and it fills in the holes as well.

So if you do end up having to make any adjustments such as skipping holes, this is a great option that you should include in your project because it will help to minimize the appearance of the hole. holes if you do need to skip holes for your first round. Before we get into round one, I just want to show you a close-up of our holes. We'll be working in the same spaces where we put our slip stitches, so you may need to pull them back a little bit so you can easily see, but we will be working in those same spaces all the way around for the next round. grab your smaller hook because we will continue to work with it for this round we are going to work a round of traditional single crochet stitches and as we're working we're going to crochet around that beginning tail so we can weave it in as we go.

First, start off by chaining one, and then you're going to insert your hook into the next hole and work a single crochet stitch, making sure to work around. that tail so we can weave it in as we go. This is my preferred method for weaving in these tails, especially because they're so large, but if you'd like to wait until the end, you can do that.

Just know that it might be a little bit more difficult, so just keep that in mind. I am going to show you what it looks like from the other side, and as you can see, our tail is nicely tucked in and hidden inside of our single crochet stitches. I'm going to continue working around the edges. around our base and then come back once I've gotten around to the other side. Round one is definitely the trickiest round because you may need to make some adjustments depending on the specs of your base.

Some of you may be able to crochet one stitch into each hole. Some of you may need to skip a few holes as you're working around. For instance, the first time I made this basket net, I worked one stitch into each hole around and I noticed that the walls of my bassinet were starting to fan out.

So I ripped it back to round one, and then I took a wild guess and decided to skip 10 holes, which would reduce the number of stitches in my bassinet from 110 to 100, but that ended up being the magic number for me. So you may need to do some trial and error for this round, but once you get it right, you will be ready for round two. once you've reached the end of round one now it's time to join and we will be using my favorite method which is the invisible join so grab your nine millimeter hook and i want to pull it a little bit closer so it's easier to see now working to on the left side of our chain from the beginning we are going to insert our hook from the back to the front and then place our loop back on our hook and pull it to the back of our work removing the loop from our hook then take your hook and insert it through the center of the chain one from the beginning yarn over and pull a loop through to the front now once you've done this you'll carefully put the loop from earlier back onto your hook and at this point you should have two loops on your hook then you'll yarn over and pull a loop through both of them and you've completed your invisible join this will be the first stitch of the next round and all following rounds and don't worry if you didn't catch it the first time around I will be showing this again a few more times as we work through this project Rounds two through 10 are pretty easy and you'll be on cruise control because they're all the same. We'll be working in the waistcoat stitch for all of these rounds.

The waistcoat stitch differs from your traditional single crochet stitch based on where you insert your hook. instead of inserting it underneath the top of your stitch, you'll insert it through the center of the stitch and then complete a single crochet stitch. Now, if you're unfamiliar with this stitch, don't worry. I have linked a step-by-step tutorial in the description box below that will get you up to speed.

Once you check that out, come back and you'll be able to work this stitch. you'll know that you're doing the stitch correctly because all of your stitches will be stacked on top of each other if you end up doing a traditional single crochet stitch you'll notice because your stitches will be slightly staggered so i'm going to continue working the waistcoat stitch all the way around and then i'll come back once i get to the end of the round so i can show you once again how to complete an invisible join so now we've come to the final stitch of round two and now it's time to work an invisible join so carefully remove your hook from the last stitch that you just worked and insert it to the left of the first stitch from the back to the front placing that loop back onto your hook you'll pull it to the back of your work and then carefully remove your hook from that loop yarn over and pull a loop to the front of your work and then place that loop that you left from earlier back onto your hook yarn over and pull a loop through two. I was going really fast there.

And so you've completed another invisible join. And now we'll work the waistcoat stitch again for rounds three through 10. And I'll come back once I've gotten through the first bundle of cords, so I can show you how to connect a new bundle of cord as you're working. But here is my base so far with just two rounds worked.

And here's the bottom. and I will see you once I get to the end of bundle one. so you've come to the end of your first bundle of cord don't worry just grab your second bundle and line up the ends together and then you'll treat the new bundle of cord as your working cord so you'll continue working the waistcoat stitch around making sure as you grab the yarn through that you're grabbing the yarn from the second bundle and then complete a waistcoat stitch now you'll notice as i'm working i'm crocheting around those two ends because i'm weaving them in as i go This will secure the two ends in place and they'll be nice and hidden. So I'm going to continue to work around these until I've completely covered the ends and then I'll show you what it looks like from the inside so you can see how they're all tucked in and hidden away. And then I will continue working the waistcoat stitch until I get to the end of round 10 and then I'll come back and show you how we begin to create our handles.

Round 11 is the round where we create the foundation of our handles. So I'm showing you here where I placed the stitch markers. The blue stitch markers notate where my handles will go and I have them centered on the long side. of the bassinet and there's seven stitches marked off the orange stitch markers notate where my hood will go and you'll notice that they start two stitches away from where the handles are marked off And so you can adjust this to your preferences, wherever you want the placement of your handles to go. I did this because I want the hood, where the hood ends and where the handles begin to flow into each other.

And you'll see that as we begin to create our handles and the hood, how it all works out in the end. So to begin round 11, we'll just work the waistcoat stitch around until we get to the first blue stitch marker. So as you're working this round, if you notice that your handles aren't exactly positioned the way you'd like them to if they seem a little bit off-center it's okay for you to rip back your stitches and readjust where your stitch markers are and so you can get them in the placement that you'd like them to be so once you get to the stitch before your blue marker you're ready to create your first handle so you'll notice here counting the stitches that are marked by the stitch markers I have seven stitches and so what I'm going to do is chain eight and then I'm going to rejoin my cord to the other side of the second blue stitch marker. I'm chaining eight because I like a pretty low profile handle and but you are welcome to adjust this to your preferences. So if you'd like to have a longer handle more like a floppy handle just add a few more stitches.

So now I'm rejoining my cord to the wall of my bassinet. by working a waistcoat stitch and the stitch to the left of that second stitch marker and now i will continue working the waistcoat stitch around to the other side and repeat the steps to create the second handle so i'm going to continue showing you how i form the second handles but i do want to pause here and just talk to you about taking care of your hands and your back your shoulders your arms as you're working this project If you've already started to work with this material, you may notice you might feel a little fatigue in your back, your arms, your hands. This is definitely a heavy-duty material to work with, and I always feel like I'm getting an upper body workout when I do some of my larger basket projects, such as this Moses basket. So, highly recommend that your working surface is at a nice height so that you're not hunched over your work. We want to prevent you from injuring your back.

or just having any aches in your back also if you start to feel any aches in your hands and your arms just take a break come back to the project tomorrow you just need a little bit of rest and also this material can be pretty drying on your hands so make sure you keep a unscented moisturizer handy so you can moisturize from time to time and you can prevent any calluses on your hands So we've just completed our invisible join and we have formed the basis of our handles. So if you're making the version of the bassinet with a hood, skip ahead to minute mark 2031. If you're not making a hood, you can continue with the instructions as follows. For this round, you'll work the waistcoat stitch until you get to your chain space from the previous round. Once you arrive to the chain space, you'll then cover the chains with traditional single crochet. crochet stitches and so the idea is to work as many stitches that you need to completely cover up that chain and i believe that once i got to the end of the chain space i had a total of nine stitches but you can work as many stitches as you need for your handle especially if you made your handle longer than mine you may need to have a few more stitches than i have as i'm working i'm gently pushing my stitches close together so they'll be nice and snug and i want to make sure that i'm completely covering that chain from round 11. once i've completed crocheting my handle i will resume working in the waistcoat stitch and crochet around until i get to the other side and then i'll repeat these same steps in the next chain space to finish my second handle.

So I'm just going to show you here what the handle looks like and it's looking good. And so now I'm on the other side, I've completed the second handle and I'm just working my way to the end of round 12. and so for those of you who are making the standard bassinet you are pretty much done and all you will need to do is cut your cord and weave your ends and so i'm not going to cut the cord here because i'm actually going to rip this round back so I can show the steps for the hooded version of this bassinet. If you skip ahead to minute mark 3110, you'll see the instructions on how to complete an invisible closure and finish your bassinet. So this is the amount of cord you'll have left from your third bundle, and this is more than enough to create two tassels to attach to the handles of your bassinet.

The instructions to create the tassels can be found at minute mark 3307. So in the next clip I'm just showing you what the final bassinet looks like and I'll include the measurements in the description box so you'll have those as a reference. And so now we will get into the instructions for how to create the hooded version of this bassinet. So now we are on the instructions for how to create the hood. so i'm pointing out the placement of my stitch markers the first two stitch markers indicate where the hood begins and ends and the other two stitch markers indicate my center stitches now if you have one center stitch then i want you to count out two stitches on either side of that center stitch for a total of five if you have two stitches that sit in the center count out two stitches from those and you'll have a total of six We will be using short rows to form our hood and we'll continue adding short rows until we reach those outer stitch markers. Grab your fourth bundle of cord as we'll be using the cord from that to create our hood.

Leave the remaining cord from bundle three on hold until the end of the project. You'll join the cord from your fourth bundle by lining up the end of that cord along the side where you'll be attaching your hood. Pull a loop through the stitch that's marked with the first stitch marker and then chain one. And then working in the waistcoat stitch, you will crochet until you get to the next stitch marker, making sure to crochet around that tail so that you can weave it in as you go and hide it in.

And this will be nice and secure so you don't have to worry about it going anywhere or coming apart. Once you get to the stitch that's marked by the second stitch marker, At this point you will cut your cord and pull the tail all the way through the top of that stitch. My cords are already cut because I've already made the hood. I just took it apart so I could record it for the tutorial. Make sure to leave a two inch tail for each of your short rows.

This will make it a lot easier when you're weaving your ends as you go. And now we will begin the second short row. You'll start two stitches to the right of your previous short row.

and then we'll work the two stitches following that short row. Join your cord to the bassinet by pulling a loop through the first stitch, chaining one, and then you will work the waistcoat stitch in all of the stitches following. So that includes the stitch immediately to the left of your first stitch, the stitches from the first short row, and then the two stitches that followed. that short row making sure to crochet over the tail from the first short row so that you can weave it in as you go you complete the final two stitches cut your cord again pulling the tail all the way through the top of the final stitch and then leave it hanging as you will crochet over it once you complete the next short row we're going to continue working in short rows in this way until we reach the two outer stitch markers and that will be the end of your short row section and then we'll be able to go and complete the final row so I'm going to speed through this part but then I will come back to show you what it looks like once I've completed it and to also show you what it measures up to be height wise You'll notice as you're creating your hood that it's forming at an angle and that is exactly how it's supposed to be.

This is a more modern take on a hood. If you're looking for a fuller coverage hood that completely covers the end of the bassinet. This is not the method for you. If you're interested in a tutorial that uses a full hood, I will include some links to them in the description box below so you can check those out.

I wanted to create a bassinet that was definitely more on the modern side very simple and i wanted the hood to kind of flow into the basket as a whole so that's why i really love the short row method i've seen this bassinet before um for like different major brands and made with wicker or other materials and i just thought this was really cool way to incorporate a hood but also keep the modern style of our basket You can adjust the size of your bassinet hood by adding more short rows. And so in doing this, you would need to adjust the placement of your handles, which is a simple fix. You could either adjust them and push them closer to the foot end of the bassinet, or you could reduce the number of stitches that you skipped to create the handles and incorporate those extra stitches into the hood itself.

So whatever customizations that you decide to incorporate into your bassinet, I highly encourage you to put on your designer hat and just have fun with it. Of course this will involve some trial and error, but the extra effort is totally worth it at the end, I promise you. If you're unsure about any of the changes that you're making, I would suggest that you instead of cutting your cord with every row, you can carry the cord along the back of your work.

and then reattach as normal and continue working from there. This will give you the flexibility to practice and experiment without making any permanent decisions and cutting your cord. And then once you got into a comfortable place, you can go back and actually work your final hood. And so what I just showed you is that I'm going to continue working my short rows until I reach those two outer stitch markers and then I will come back show you the final version of my hood and then i'll also take some measurements so you can see its final height and then we'll get into the last row of this project and so here is our completed hood and as you can see we just have one tail remaining and we will crochet that over that as we worked our final round so i'm going to quickly measure the back of our hood And as you can see, it measures out to 17 inches, which is a good height. And again, if you wanted to increase your hood, the coverage of your hood, just add a few more short rows.

But I'm going to stop at this point. And now we're ready to work our final round. So as you can see, I am working again from the third bundle of cord that I had left at the back of my bassinet. And we're going to work.

the waistcoat stitch all the way around crocheting over the chain that forms our handles working in the same method as we did for the version of the bassinet without a hood so here i am placing nine single crochet stitches around the chain to complete the handles shifting them slightly closer together to make sure that everything is nice and snug and completely covering that chain And then once I've completed the nine single crochet stitches around the chain, I will immediately begin to work in the waistcoat stitch again, working in that stitch that's to the left of my chain space, and then immediately going into the stitches that create our hood. So I'm showing you what it's looking like so far, and now I'm going to work the first stitch that's to the left of my handles. and now i'm crocheting into the hood itself and you can sort of view this as your final short row because it is going to add maybe one more inch of coverage into your hood area the hood space so i'm going to work this all the way around until i get to the other side So this next part here I could have edited out but I did want to leave it in because it is a realistic thing that can happen.

Not only is working with this material rough on your hands, it could be hard on your back, but it can be also hard on your crochet hook. And so my crochet hook is about to break right here. And I was a little heartbroken. No worries though, I am going to fix it. I have some glue that I can use to reattach it.

I would highly recommend if you have a solid hook that's like a solid piece of aluminum or solid piece of wood use that instead of your fancy hooks. I have broken plenty of my fancy hooks that were made of resin or other materials that were not meant to be used with this type of material. So keep that in mind when you take this project on.

Leave the fancy hooks to the side and get a more heavy duty one preferably something that is one solid piece. so you don't have to worry about accidentally breaking the tip away from the handle. So we've made it to the end of the final round of this bassinet and now you can take your scissors, cut your cord, and then we will finish off by using the invisible closure method and secure and weave our end.

so i've cut my cord and i pulled the tail all the way through and now i'm going to show you how much of the cord i have left from the third bundle so i have a good amount and i still have enough to make my tassels which i will show you later on in this video our invisible closure is very similar to our invisible join the point is to create a closure that is flush or that completely matches the other stitches around it So I'm taking that tail and I'm feeding it from the front to the back of my work, wrapping it around the first stitch from the round, and then I'm inserting the tail through the top of the last stitch of the round. And so your tail should end up in the back of your work or the inside of your bassinet, but you're not done. And now you need to secure that tail by tying a knot.

So I'm going to tie a knot here. And then I'm going to pull it nice and tight to make sure it is secure in place. And then once I've done that, I will use my crochet hook to weave the end behind the stitches. So I apologize for the angling here, but I will show you at the end what the final result is of weaving my ends. And then you're all done.

So here's what it looks like. And it's nice and hidden and snug. It's not going anywhere.

And you don't have to worry about it unraveling and coming apart. So I showed you the knot. And then I showed you where I would...

the ends. So I'm just shaping it up a little bit and on the next shot I'll show you the final bassinet. And so here is our completed bassinet and you could stop here if you'd like. All you would need to do is add the appropriate mattress and then your bassinet is ready for baby.

I'm going to add one more thing, a decorative element to bassinet. And so you can follow the next steps here to create your own tassels to add to the handles of your basket. So first start off by cutting your cords. I have the measurements and the amounts of all the cords on the screen here.

And I'm making two sets because I'm making two tassels. Take your 13 inch cord. and line them up on your working surface. Then take the 23 inch cord and tie a knot closer to the end.

This will be the like hanging loop that you use to attach your tassel to your bassinet. Then you'll lay this over the end of your 13 inch cords and then just fold them over. Try to get them as aligned as you can. The point here is to hide that knot from the loop within those cords.

So I'm adjusting a bit and now I'm going to take the 26 inch cord and I'm going to secure everything in place with a wrap knot. Taking the end of your cord and having it facing up, you'll create a U shape and then you'll take your working cord and begin to carefully wrap it around that area. You want to make sure that it's nice and snug and close together while you are holding all of those strands in position.

And we're going to keep wrapping until we get close to the end of the bottom of the loop that we created, that U shape that we created from earlier. So once you've had enough wraps, take your crochet hook and insert it into that loop and pull the tail of your cord through. And then pulling the tail that's sticking up from the top, you'll gently pull that through until the knot is in the center of your wraps.

So be careful here. You don't want to pull it all the way through. If that does happen, you'll need to start over. But we want to get it to the center so you can see that I'm feeling. to see where that knot is positioned and then once it's in a good place i'm just shifting some of my strands around and now i'm ready to cut the excess cord and then you can further hide that end by taking the end of your crochet hook and just tucking it in within the wraps so that it's you're unable to see it and then you're ready to trim your tails of your tassel so I'm taking my big scissors this time I probably should have had them earlier this I think is scissor pair of scissors number three in today's tutorial so I'm just using them to trim my ends to get everything in alignment and then you are all done and now you can attach your tassels to your bassinet So if you've gotten to the end of this tutorial and the end of this project, you need to give yourself a pat on the back because this was a full workout and took a lot of effort and I'm very proud of you.

Thank you for sticking it through to the end. Whether you're making this project for yourself or for a loved one or friend, this is such a special project. And I hope they appreciate all of the love and effort that you put into every stitch. Of course, if you have any questions...

You can put them in the comments below. If it's something that's a little bit more advanced, send me an email. All of my information is in the description box. If you enjoyed this tutorial, make sure you like, comment, and subscribe.

And once again, I thank you for watching, and I hope to see you in the next one. Bye!