Crochet Doll - Sofia

I feel a great fascination for doing things in crochet, and for a long time I was worried because it is very difficult for me to count stitches, it is something that I have never been able to do. But I have realized that there is another way to crochet, it is with shape logic, all based on spheres, cylinders, cubes, and in general basic shapes (something like drawing, or 3d modeling), and thanks to this I have been able to make many things, among them what I like to do the most are amigurumi animals, dolls and bags.

In this instructable, I am going to show you how I made my doll and two of her clothing items.

This is the starting knot that I always use for any figure that I am going to crochet.

On the internet I found that the stitch I used to make the whole doll is called "single crochet".

For most of the clothing items I used the same stitch, except for the skirt, for that I used a stitch called "3 dc shell" and "4 dc shell".

In the images of this step, I show how to start a sphere. For this, I repeat the "single crochet" stitch several times, always returning to the starting knot.

For the sphere to be perfect (especially when you don't know how to count stitches) use a stress ball and cover it, following its shape. (This will be the doll's head.)

To create the sphere shape it is necessary from time to time to increase the stitches so that the fabric grows. For this, two stitches must be made in a row on the same stitch.

After passing the middle of the sphere, it is necessary to start decreasing stitches from time to time so that the fabric begins to decrease. (At first I had to undo and re-crochet some parts of the sphere while learning to follow the shape of the ball)

For this, one stitch is made from two stitches as shown in the images.

For the legs, what I did was think of a small half-sphere and a cylinder joined together.

So I started the same way I started the head sphere but stopped when the circle I was crocheting was the width I wanted the legs to be. Then I started to crochet with the same stitch I have been using (single crochet), this time following the stitches already created, without increasing or decreasing any, until I liked how long it was. Then I repeated the same process, doing my best to make it the same size.

At the end of the second leg, I made 3 extra stitches and from there I joined it to the other leg. Then I started crocheting around both legs and the join created in the center between them. I did this without increasing or decreasing stitches.

For the torso I decreased a few stitches when I was reaching the waist and then I increased a few stitches when I was reaching the breasts (two stitches). I stuffed the torso of the doll with foam and then I made the arms the same way I did the legs (although thinner) and when I liked them I attached them to each side of the upper torso and continued to crochet around the upper part of the torso and the arms and I decreased stitches to close the doll and to be able to join the neck and head.

(The way I joined the arms is perhaps better understood later with the pictures of the sweater)

For the hair, the first thing I did was a half-sphere that covered part of the head.

In the images, you can see how a crochet chain is made. After making a chain as long as I wanted the hair, I made the "single crochet" stitch and at the end, I left two pieces of thread to be able to tie it later to the part created in the previous step.

I decided to use different shades of brown and yellow and little by little I tied them to the base created for the hair. Finally, I sewed this to the doll's head.

For the face, I drew eyes, nose, and mouth with pencil, then I embroidered with thin thread. (I did not use any special stitch for the embroidery, I was just sewing looking to fill the empty spaces with color)

I started with a crochet chain to know what size the dress should be, when I liked its width, I started to knit the "single crochet" stitch and changed the color of the thread in each line I made.

For the skirt I used the stitches called "3 dc shell" and "4 dc shell".

On the first row, I used the "3 dc shell" stitch which consists of making 3 double crochet stitches, always inserting the hook in the same stitch. I repeated this the whole row, skipping one stitch of the previous row every time I created a 3 dc shell.

From the second row, I made the "4 dc shell" stitch, which consists of making 4 double crochet stitches instead of 3. And instead of skipping a stitch of the previous row every time I created a shell, I used the middle of a shell of the previous row as the stitch I would insert the hook in for creating a new one.

I continued this process until I liked how long the dress was.

For the sweater, the first thing I did was measure the width of the arm with a crochet chain, from this I created two hollow cylinders to serve as sleeves.

Then I made a rectangle that would cover the torso.

I attached the cylinders to the top of the rectangle and started crocheting around these, including both the rectangle and the cylinders. After one row I started to decrease stitches so that it starts to take the shape of the doll where it has the shoulders and reaches the neck. Finally, when I liked how it looked I tied a knot to finish it off.

I hope you liked this instructable.

I know that it is a little different from the instructions that are usually seen on the internet about crochet projects since they usually count the stitches, but I hope that this way of thinking about knitting and crochet (without thinking about how many stitches it may have) can help you, and give you new ideas. And especially for those that haven't been able to do anything by following numbers, encourage them to try making their own crochet projects and explore the shapes they can create!