2 Inch Christmas Bauble Cover - Version 2

Whoops - just discovered the cruel reality of accidentally deleting a new post I'd been writing... Rookie mistake I guess.

Anyhow... I have made another 2 inch diameter (6 inch circumference) Crocheted Christmas Bauble which was completely inspired by the tutorial by Pip Lincoln from Meet me at Mike's

Oh what a difference 0.5mm of a crochet hook makes!  I had no idea.  Anyway, this time I used a 3.0mm crochet hook.  I realised that the reason I used the 3.5mm last time is that it was a metal hook, whereas the only 3.0mm crochet hook that I used for this bauble cover is bamboo which I don't find to be as easy to use.  It's strange because I remember that when I first started crafting, so many knitters told me that bamboo knitting needles were the bomb and I just had to use them.  People showed me their needles that were worn down where they rubbed against one another so I simply assumed that bamboo was going to be the better material to craft with no matter what.  I guess it's all a matter of trial and error but when I tried crocheting a granny square blanket with a bamboo hook and cotton, I found it to be incredibly "sticky" and it just didn't work.  It wasn't as bad using baby Merino, but I still think that using a metal hook would have been preferable.

None the less, I started the Crocheted Christmas Bauble pattern in the same way that Pip did up until the end of Round 2.

Round 1 - just as Pip’s first round i.e. no clusters, just 15 treble crochet stitches and an initial stitch consisting of 3 chains up from the base chain.

Round 2 – just as Pip’s 2^nd round i.e. 8 clusters with no chains in between each cluster.

Round 3 – this is where I change the pattern a bit – I do 8 clusters with a single chain stitch in between.

Round 4 – I do 8 clusters with 2 chain stitches between each cluster

Round 5 – I do 8 clusters with 3 chain stitches between each cluster

Round 6 – is the same as my Round 5 (3 chains between clusters)

Round 7 – is the same as my Round 4 (2 chains between clusters)

Round 8 – is the same as my Round 3 (1 chain between clusters)

Round 9 - I slip the cover over the bauble and crochet the rest of the rounds with the bauble in place.  It is a little difficult at first, but after a while you get the hang of it.  Round 9 is the same as Round 2 (no chains between clusters)

Round 10 - because I used a slightly smaller needle I'm able to do a 10th Round and this time I do 8 clusters with no chain in between, HOWEVER, each cluster only consists of 2 treble stitches (of course, with the exception of the first cluster which is made up of a chain 3 and one treble stitch).

Again, when joining the last cluster of a round to the first cluster of that same round, thereby closing the round, I do one less chain than I have been doing between clusters in that same Round. For example on my version of Round 3, where I do a single chain between each cluster, as I’m about to close the round, after my final cluster, instead of chaining 1 and then closing with a slip stitch, I don’t do a single chain at all and simply join the last cluster to the first cluster of the round with a slip stitch. At the end of my Round 4 (where there are 2 chain stitches between clusters) I join the last cluster to the first cluster with a single chain followed by a slip stitch into the initial cluster. And so on... 

And this is the result this time:

I really like the effect of using the variegated wool on this one. 

As before I then just cut off the string that was already on the bauble and thread the end of the wool I was crocheting with through the loop on top to make the bauble’s own coloured loop to hang the bauble on the tree.

My arm is killing me and I'm back at work today, so I might just ease off on the crafting today.