by Ardeana Hamlin
of The Weekly Staff
For a while during the winter, crocodile body parts were strewn around my crafting area — the head, the body with its snaky tail, the four stumpy feet and two bowl-like eye sockets. All of it green. All of it crocheted.
The crocodile was crocheted by request. When my grandson, who was soon to be 4 years old, visited during the holidays, he spotted my copy of “Crochet One-Skein Wonders,” edited by Judith Durant and Edie Eckman, which had on the cover an image of a crocheted crocodile.
“Will you make that for me?” he asked. His face was alight with the smile that always melts the heart of this doting grammie.
“Of course, I will,” I replied, even though I crocheting toys is not my forte, mainly because I don’t like sewing all the pieces together, not do I like the process of stuffing body parts toy animals with fiberfill. But those were minor details, really, in the grand scheme of doing something that would make my grandson’s face light up with pleasure when he received the crocodile
So as I crocheted I did not to dwell on the details of sewing body parts together and stuffing them with fiberfill.
My grandson wanted a crocodile, thus he would get a crocodile, made by my very own hands, for his birthday.
The pattern called for Berroco yarn, but I used what I had in my yarn stash, the tried and true, all-
purpose Peaches and Creme cotton yarn. I also had the required size H crochet hook (not
to mention several dozen others in steel, aluminum and plastic in sizes both numerical and
alphabetical).
A few days after my grandson made his request, I was all snarled up in creating the crocodile’s head, and by the end of the week, the other parts of the critter also had been created.
I stuffed all the parts with fiberfill, which turned out to be much less of chore than my dreading had made it; sewed the head part to the body and the four legs to the body. Sewing on the legs caused me endless frustration because there was no way to pin them securely to make for accurate placement. Thus, the front legs are a bit too close together and the hind legs are a bit too far apart, but this, I discovered, gives the crocodile charm and character.
I embellished the toy with a pair of brown and tan buttons I sewed to the eye sockets, and an
artificial butterfly, purchased at a flower shop in Hampden, is perched atop the tip of the crocodile’s tail.
But wait — I forgot to mention, — “Crochet One-Skein Wonders” also contains a pattern for a lobster. My grandson spotted that photo, too. And five minutes after he requested that I make the crocodile he asked, “Will you make that for me, too, Grammie?”
As soon as I finished the crocodile, I started on the lobster. The instructions called
for lots of increases and decreases to shape the claws, the body and the tail fins. I kept
losing count, pulling out the rounds of work and starting again, prompting more than a few under-my-breath snarls and growls. I was some happy when that bright red crocheted crustacean was finished.
But the few frustrations I encountered while crocheting the crocodile and the lobster were quickly forgotten when my little grandson opened the package containing the crocheted creatures and his face lit up with his million-dollar smile.