#FROG Started from the bottom, now we restartin'

Yesterday, my latest pattern went live. If you’re a fan of the best boy, Lotad, check it out here or on Ravelry. As usual, I learned a thing… or two… (or three) about crochet during the pattern design process, so read ahead if you wanna learn how to avoid these mistakes the next time you whip up a new project!

Here’s the TLDR on what I learned:

1. Stagger your increases
2. Don’t close up your work on the most visible part of your toy
3. Do not needle felt through two layers of crochet. That’s dumb.

OK, let’s get into it!

1. Stagger your increases

Generally, when one crochets a circular object in-the-round, it’s typical to see a very regular and predictable growing stitch pattern in the project pattern/instructions like the one below:

inc x 6

sc, inc x 6

2sc, inc x 6…

…and so on and so forth! The upside to this sort of evenly-spaced, predictable stitch increase is that the pattern is simple to read, and easy to follow. Seasoned crocheters can almost stop reading the pattern for a bit and check in every few rounds to see what comes next. The downside, however, is this: the larger your crocheted piece becomes, the more obvious it is that your object is not a circle, but rather, a growing hexagon. When increases are placed in the same location round after round, a noticeable “bulge” appears, creating “corners”. This isn’t such a huge issue for smaller spherical objects, which is why you see this type of pattern so frequently. It IS a huge issue for focal pieces of amigurumi projects, such as the Lotad’s lily pad.

Take a look at my first lily pad prototype:

Can you see the “corners” of hexagon forming? (I suppose it’s more of a pentagon because of the a gap in the lily pad, haha). This is the result of a regular, predictable stitch increase. In addition to weird corners, you’ll notice that the lily pad appears crooked too. In my first design, I didn’t account for the effect of the “increase bulge” from increases at the end of each row. Whoops.

To avoid the “increase bulge,” stagger your increases. Changing the location of the increase from round to round will give your finished a more circular appearance. Here’s an example of the lily pad pattern to make this idea slightly clearer:

ch 1, 4 sc, inc, (13 sc, inc) x 3, 9 sc (60)    TURN

ch 1, 7 sc, inc, (14 sc, inc) x 3, 7 sc (64)    TURN

ch 1, 5 sc, inc, (15 sc, inc) x 3, 10 sc (68)  TURN

ch 1, 8 sc, inc, (16 sc, inc) x 3, 8 sc (72)    TURN

Here, I had to increase the stitch count by 4 per round. Instead of writing (14 sc, inc) x 4, I took the first repetition of the pattern (14 sc, inc) and divided the number of single crochets. I left one portion (7 sc) at the beginning of the row and another portion (7 sc) at the end. The increase is added after the first 7 sc to avoid a crooked product. Rows with an odd number of stitches (13 sc), are divided up a bit differently. So long as your increases aren’t consistently ended up in the same location, you’re good to go!

Staggering your stitches may sound tedious, but the devil is in the details! Check out this side-by-side (sort of) comparison:

Believe it or not, the circumference of the top layer is the same in both lily pads (76 stitches)!!

2. Started from the bottom, now we restartin’

This is something that no one really explicitly states in a pattern and it is believed to be universally understood: Thou shall close up thy amigurumi on the bottom, not the top. The reason for this is rather obvious: it’s way easier to hide imperfections and decreases from view if they happen to be on the underside of your work… where no one looks. Lucky for me, I over-estimated my ability to close up my work neatly. Over-estimating my power level + lopsided increases = a not so impressive product.

The centre of the lily pad appears “cinched” in the middle. This also causes problems in the long run because you don’t end up with a lovely yarn tail that can be used to attach the lily pad to Lotad’s head. This was a very blatant and silly oversight on my end. I deserved to restart hahahaha.

3. Needle felting for dummies

This is another one of those “universally understood” crafting rules: Thou shall needle felt through one layer of crochet, not two. Given the mechanics of needle felting, it’s no surprise why this is considered a universal rule. Anyway! If you will be crocheting a piece like Lotad’s lily pad with 2 layers of work, take a break in between layers and decorate your work. Trust me. Even though you may only want your felting details to show on the top layer of your work, you will inevitably cause felting on the underside of your work, too. This will create an unwanted fuzziness and unsightly finished product. Haha it was so awful, I don’t have a full photo of the problem. You can see evidence of the unwanted felting in this wip photo here:

With all the issues with lily pad #1, I knew I had to start from scratch. Thankfully I had just enough yarn (like, literally just enough) to complete a better one. :)

Well, that’s it! Did you face palm on my behalf? If you did, I don’t blame ya. Thanks for reading and until next time!

Cindy.

P.S., Thanks for making it to the end. Here’s a bonus derp wip photo just for you!

Lotad, or psyduck?