How to crochet buttons

I love these! I've gotten to the point now that every pattern I have that required buttons, I use these little crocheted buttons. I've even started adding them to patterns that don't call for buttons because they secure my accent flowers. I'm hoping to post an example later this week of a pattern with an accent flower and how to bring the whole thing together.

They only take a couple minutes and are a GREAT solution for leftover yarn scraps at the end of a skein.


Notes:
I normally say use whatever hook you are comfortable with, but these buttons need to be small so you can use them. Because of that, I recommend using an E/3.5mm hook. It will give the buttons the right size when you are finished.


Pattern:
Ch 4 and join with sl st to form a ring.

RND 1: Ch 1. Sc until you fill the ring easily. (No less than six, no more than twelve-ish). Depending on the size button you want, you can adjust the number of sc you put in the ring. For the purposes of the pattern, it really doesn't matter.

For this button, I did 8sc in the ring for RND 1.

RND 2: Ch 1. 2 sc in same st as joining and in each st around. Sl st in ch 1 to finish round.

RND 3: Ch 1. [Insert hook into same st as joining, YO and pull through, insert hook into next st, YO and pull through, YO and pull through all loops on hook] DEC made. DEC in each st around. Fasten off, leaving a long tail for sewing later.

This is from the back/working side. As you dec, the sides will fold in on themselves. This is correct. When you are finished, squish the button flat, and the second layer adds a bit of firmness to the button.

This is the finished button from the front. Very simple, but super cute.

Flower accents

I've tried making flowers a ton of different ways for different projects I've worked on. This is, by far, my favorite pattern.

This one I did not creatively change in any way. It is a straight copy of a red heart pattern, but below you will see my photos of the pattern as I go and how to work through some of the slight speed bumps you might face.


Notes:
One of the sts in this pattern was one I wasn't familiar with, a treble stitch (abbreviated tr). It is just like a double crochet, but one more. Let me explain. When you do a double crochet, you YO, insert hook, YO and pull through, YO and drop 2 loops, YO and drop 2 loops. For the treble, you YO YO, insert hook, YO and pull through, YO and drop 2 loops, YO and drop 2 loops, YO and drop 2 loops. So, you wrap one time extra and grab and drop one time extra. In theory, you could do this as many times as you want and just make the stitch longer and longer. But for this pattern you only need the tr as I've described it above.

Pattern:

Ch 6, sl st to form a loop

RND 1: Chain 5. *Dc, ch 2** repeat from * to ** five times. Sl st in chain 5 to finish round. Should have a circle with 6 posts (looks kind of like spokes in a wheel).

RND 2: Chain 1. In ch sp from below: *sc, hdc, dc, tr, dc, hdc, sc.** to make a petal. Repeat * to ** in each chain space. Sl st in chain 1 to finish off round.

RND 3: Ch 1.  Flip flower forward so you are looking at the back. Sc around the post created in RND 1. Ch 3. Repeat around each post and sl st to finish.

 Reaching behind the flower to sc in the post

After the first ch 3 is finished

The back of the flower after all the Sc CH combos have been done.

RND 4:  Ch 1. In the ch spaces made by RND 3: sc, hdc, dc, tr, tr, tr, dc, hdc, sc to make a petal. Repeat in each ch sp around. Sl st in ch 1 to finish round. Notice you are doing the same thing from RND 2, you are just adding 2 more tr sts.

What a finished RND 4 looks like.

RND 5: Ch 1. Sc around post from RND 3. Ch 4. Repeat around and sl st in ch 1 to finish off. This is the same as RND 3 except you add a extra ch in each ch sp.

RND 6: Ch 1. In ch spaces made by RND 5: sc, hdc, dc, tr, tr, tr, tr, tr, dc, hdc, sc to make a petal. Repeat in each ch sp around. Sl st in ch 1 to finish round. Fasten off. Again, this is the same as RND 4, but you add 2 more tr sts. Even though I ended my flower here, you could, in theory, keep going with it forever. For each sc and ch round you would add another ch, and in each petal round you would add another 2 tr sts.

Finished flower after RND 6.

These are super easy to make and VERY cute.



Beret

So, a friend of mine commissioned two crocheted berets for her daughters as Christmas presents. I am using a modified version of a Red Heart pattern. I say modified because I did not like the way the original pattern came together.

Red Heart's picture of their pattern

This is my walk through of the pattern and explanation of my changes.


Note:
to make inc in this pattern [ch 1, 3 dc] twice in same sp
to make dec in this pattern draw up loop in ea of next 2 dc, yo and through all 3 loops on hook. (basically, sc together 2 dc from previous rnd).

Ch 5; join with sl st to make a circle

RND 1: Ch 3, 2 dc in ring, ch 1. [3 dc in ring, ch 1] repeat 4 times. join to ch 3 with sl st.  5 sets

RND 2: [ch 3, 2 dc] in next dc. *Ch 1, 3 dc in next sp. ch 1, skip next dc** 3 dc in next sp. Then, continue from * to ** all the way around. Sc into top of ch 3 to finish the round. (I know this is different than the usual sl st into ch to finish round, but it works here). 10 groups of 3 dc.

The spaces are from the ch 1, skip a dc part.

RND 3: Ch 3, 2 dc over sc from previous rnd. [Inc in next sp. Ch 1, dc 3 in next sp.] repeat until end of rnd. Sc into top of ch 3 to finish the rnd. 15 groups of 3 dc.

Notice the pretty pentagonal shape here. The inc sts go into the sp from rnd 2 where the 2 are clustered, and the non-inc sets go into the spaces in the above pic.

RND 4: Ch 3, 2 dc over sc from previous rnd. ch 1 and 3 dc in every space around. (this kills the pretty pentagon and makes it a messy circle). sc in top of ch 3 to finish rnd. 15 groups of 3 dc.

RND 5: Ch 3, 2 dc over sc from previous rnd. *ch 1, 3 dc in next sp, inc in next space** ch 1, 3 dc in next sp. Then continue from * to ** around. Then sc in top of ch 3 to finish the rnd. (This basically reforms the pentagon from above). 20 groups of 3 dc.

RND 6: Repeat RND 3 from above. (this continues the pentagonal shape but with 2 groups of 3 dc in between ea corner instead of 1). 30 groups of 3 dc.

RNDs 7-10: Repeat RND 4. (aaaaaaand we destroy the pentagon again to make a circle. It will start to curl up on the ends, this is correct).

This is row 8. This is where the ends start to curl up.

RND 11: Repeat RND 4 one last time, EXCEPT end with a sl st in top of ch 3 to end the rnd, instead of a sc.

RND 12: Ch 3, dc in ea sp around and join with a sl st at top of ch 3 to finish the rnd. 90-93 sts. (This is my deviation from the pattern. The original pattern says to skip the ch-1 spaces, but this only comes to like 60 sts, not the 90 they call for. So, dc in every st).

RND 13: Ch 1. *sc in same st as joining and in next 6 dc (7 sc total). Dec. ** repeat from * to ** around and join with sl st to first sc. 80ish sts.

RND 14-17: Repeat RND 13. (this is another deviation from original pattern. It called for simply sc in all sts for 7 rnds and then folding in half to finish off. This made a HUGE beret, much too large to fit my head [and I have a pretty big head]. The pattern also called for optionally adding elastic inside this packet, but with as large as this was, the elastic would have been necessary. By just continuing to dec for several rnds, you don't need to do as many rnds, and you wont need the elastic).

Enjoy!