Crochet seahorses

Shrewsbury

Dear World,

Please look kindly on me.  This is my first attempt at a blog and I haven’t written anything creative in yonks.

I have changed career and now spend my time knitting, crocheting (is there such a word?), sewing, woodworking and trying my best to play golf.  Did Yoda say  

Do or do not. There is no try.

or words to that effect?  When I try too hard it all goes pear shaped, so I should just do.

Today I want to tell you about crochet seahorses.  I have made some crochet seahorses for some non-crocheting friends and used this pattern:

http://www.ravelry.com/designers/chinami-horiba

I made this as part of a trio of seahorses for Elsie as a wall hanging.  I altered the pattern so that the middle seahorse was facing in the opposite direction which was quite tricky, especially with his ear.  The only trouble was he felt a bit skinny to me.

I have been working on my own version of a crocheted seahorse.  The first thing that I did was to print an image of a seahorse.  I chose one with ‘ribs’ that were really pronounced and would help the design.  He had a beautiful spine that would be great for a picot edging and a dainty fin.  I also wanted to make him have a more rounded belly.

The next thing I did was to lay tracing paper over the image and then started to draw the foundation chains along its back.  I used front and back post stitches of various sizes, single crochet, double crochet, half double crochet, treble crochet and slip stitches.

I worked several test pieces because I found that the tail curled way too much and I wanted it to lay flat in its own space.

Eventually I finished my design and came up with this lovely little chap. He is only the height of an ordinary pen, so much more compact than the pattern I worked with at first. I hope you like him.

seahorse8.pdfDownload

Cheers,
Lizzie