Crochet Humanoid Figure

Latest project - a little crochet thread figure base for a character.

For every project I make notes and diagrams in my graph paper notebook.

Finished size is about 5 inches tall.  Worked in crochet thread and embroidery thread on steel hooks.  For construction I started with head down into shoulders, then feet up into body and connect to shoulder piece.  Then separate arms attached to shoulders and hands added last.  The hands had to be very small so I had to find a matching embroidery thread color.  I could have done a little mitten.  Might change it up if I make another.  Wrote about three pages of notes to get everything right.  I intend to sew some little cloth clothes for him.

Pattern:

Hooks: 2.75mm and 1.3mm

Thread: Off white crochet thread & matching embroidery thread

Head:

Worked in rows and joined each row

R1: 5 sc in ring

R2: 10

R3: 12

R4: 12

R5: 12

R6: 12

R7: 10

Here I tied off, wove the tail through the 10 stitches and pulled tight.

Shoulders: 

Worked 6 slip stitches into the base of the finished off head - alternately you could decrease from 10 to 6 stitches.. not sure why I did it this way.  Worked 6 sc into the slip stitches, then work the shoulders/chest:

R1: Sc, sc, inc, sc, sc, inc

R2: Sc, sc, inc, inc, sc, sc, inc, inc

R3: Sc, sc, 3 sc in the next stitch - repeat 3 more times

R4: Sc, sc, sc, 3 sc in the next stitch, (sc, sc, sc, sc, 3 sc in the next stitch) repeat 2 more times, end with sc & tie off

Feet, legs, body:

R1: 6 sc in ring and slip to the first stitch (6), then ch and work 2 sc into the first 2 stitches (2), turn ch and work sc into the two you just made (2)

R2: ch 1, turn and in the back loops only, decrease the 2 stitches into 1, work another decrease into the side of the two rows of 2 sc, then work 5 sc around the circular part, work a decrease in the other side of the 2 short rows and slip stitch to the first stitch (8)

R3: Decrease, 4 sc, decrease (6)

R4: Decrease, 4 sc (5)

Then work rows of 5 sc (12 rows including round 4) and there should be 14 rows total in the foot and leg combined.

Tie off the first leg and work a second.

To connect the legs and start the body, you'll position the legs together so the feet are at an angle you like and work some sc in the current leg you just made until you get to the middle of the body (looking at the photos, I worked the left leg first and the right second) to make the gap between the legs, foundation sc a few stitches (mine was 2) and then attach to the second leg by sc around.  Then sc into the back side of the foundation stitches, and back around the first leg until you get to the first stitch you made so the pattern would be like:

In current leg, sc 3, foundation sc 2 stitches and then connect to the first leg and sc around (5), 2 sc in the back of the foundation sc, and 2 into the first leg, sl st to the first sc.  Work the next row, continuing around the current leg, into the foundation chain, around the other leg and back (14 stitches)

Then work around and around in rows of 14 stitches, should be 9-10 total rows in the body.

To connect the body to the shoulders, mark the 4 points where the shoulders will fold to meet the round body (2 opposite sides will attach to the body and 2 will become the arm holes).  For this, the shoulder piece will have 4 sides of 7 stitches each (not exactly on the corners) and those corners will meet on the two sides of the round body piece.  I added a little stuffing and sewed together with sewing thread & needle.

Arms:

R1: Sc 5 into a ring, slip to first stitch

R2: Work 5 sc in the back loops only (this end is the wrist so depending on what kind of hand you will make, you may want to work in both loops and keep the end open

Work about 8 rows of 5 sc and in the last full row, increase to 6 stitches, put the increase anywhere.

Last row: to make an angled shoulder work a short row of 2 sc and 1 slip stitch

Push a little more stuffing into the arm holes and sew on arms

Fingers and Thumbs:

For this I switched to embroidery thread and smaller hook and worked very small I cords.  These are very fidgety and leave a lot of ends to sew in.

For the fingers:

R1: Ch 3 and pull up a loop through chains 1 and 2 (3 loops on the hook)

R2: Pop off the first two loops and chain 1 through the remaining loop.  Put loop 2 back on the hook and chain 1, put loop 1 back on the hook and chain 1.

R3: Repeat row 2

R4: Pop off first two loops and chain 1 through the remaining loop.  Put the 2nd loop back on the hook and pull through the first, pull loop 1 through as well, tie off

For the thumb, work the same pattern but skip round 3 to make it shorter.

To attach the fingers and thumb, I used a different method on each hand.  First method is just sewing on individual fingers onto the end of the arm and the second is to crochet around all 4 fingers and then attach that to the arm.