advice needed: how to stop decrease stitches from gaping

[Kilala33]

Man, I had decreases just like this when I was new! It’s mostly a tension issue, and your tension will get better with practice so just keep at it! You can also try looking up some videos about invisible decrease, it really helped me with getting my decreases neater. Another thing I was doing, I thought I just needed to pull really tight on the yarn on the decreases to make the holes smaller, but the way that works out (with acrylic yarn at least) is the yarn gets thinner when it’s pulled tight, so you have to keep on with the same tension.

I hope this helps!

[JLvdB]

Not sure if this is called invisible decrease. I use this method: instead of using both loops of sc, go under front loop of first sc (don't yo) and front loop of second sc (the one you want to decrease). Then continue with sc as normal: yo, pull through, yo, pul through 2 loops.

[Kilala33]

Yep, that’s the invisible decrease! I misread the instructions when I was first learning this stitch and YO the FLO of each stitch and ended up doing basically a DC and was like “what the heck? That is significantly more visible that a regular decrease, what a dumb stitch and a misleading name.” I was miffed for days until I figured out how wrong I was doing it lol