Faunula

How patterns are made

I want you never to have to guess. This is how every pattern is made and looked after, shown on a real one: Pocket Butterfly.

It starts with a collection

A pattern begins as part of a collection, planned before the first toy is designed. The collection fixes the yarn and hook, how big a toy may be and how many pieces and stitches it may take, so the toys that come out of it are one family, and each is still its own creature.

From the Pocket Garden Friends collection The frame, and one toy in it

All eightPocket Butterfly
YarnDK cottonDK cotton
Hook3.25 mm3.25 mm
Size4.5–6.7 cm (1¾–2¾ in)6 cm (2¼ in)
Pieces3–77

The collection Pocket Garden Friends

Every round is counted twice

The rounds are written from a record of every stitch. Before a pattern is published, a checker recounts each round from that record, and a round whose written count and recounted count disagree stops the pattern.

From the Pocket Butterfly Forewing, every round

Yarn C Dusty rose B Muted lavender

  1. R1C6 sc in the magic ring.6 sts
  2. R2Cinc 6.12 sts
  3. R3–R5Bsc 12.12 sts
  4. R6B[sc 2, invdec] 3 times.9 sts
  5. R7B[sc, invdec] 3 times.6 sts

Every placement is given by round and stitch

Where an eye, an ear or a wing goes is given as a round and a stitch, counted from a marked point, and checked against the rounds it names. You count to the spot instead of judging it by eye.

From the Pocket Butterfly The eyes

Left eye Right eye
Post R2, between T+2 and T+3 R2, between T−2 and T−3

The diagrams come from the same record

Each diagram is drawn from the record the words come from and checked against it, so a diagram and the text beside it cannot disagree. These are the same two eyes, on the head map.

From the Pocket Butterfly The head map

R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 belly: the round’s first stitches T — scrap on R5 butterfly’s left eye R2, between T+2 and T+3 butterfly’s right eye R2, between T−2 and T−3 left antenna base across R4–R5, between T+1 and T+2 right antenna base across R4–R5, between T−1 and T−2 Seen from the front the butterfly’s left on your right
Diagram 2Head map. Each ring is one round, divided into its own stitches. T, the top, is straight up, on the line from the centre of the ring through the scrap on R5; the butterfly’s left is on your right. The eyes go in at the R5 pause, before any filling; the antennae are sewn on last, on the closed head. A flat schematic of a head that domes once stuffed — push the posts in, look from the front, then press the washers on.
  • Eyes — 5 mm, each post in the gap between the 2nd and 3rd stitch from T on R2: between T+2 and T+3 for the butterfly’s left eye, T−2 and T−3 for its right.
  • Antenna bases — each cord's base is sewn across the R4/R5 boundary along one line, between T+1 and T+2 for the left antenna and between T−1 and T−2 for the right, so the two stand on the crown about 1.4 cm apart and lean out.
  • T — the top: the scrap tied through the 10th stitch of R5, and the line from it to the centre of the ring.

I crochet the samples

The finished toy settles the size, and more than once it has sent me back to change a round. Each make is recorded with its yarn, its hook and the size it came out, and every pattern page shows its makes and the checks it passed.

From the Pocket Butterfly What the pattern page shows

Stitch check
passed
Placement check
passed
Diagram check
passed
Finished makes recorded
1
Photographs of a make
3

The pictures say what they are

The pictures that show a design are generated illustrations, and each one is labelled as one. Once a toy has been made and photographed, the illustrations are redrawn from its photographs, so they show the toy as the pattern really makes it. The photographs themselves are shown separately.

From the Pocket Butterfly An illustration beside a photograph of the make

Illustration: a crocheted butterfly with a cream head, two brown cord antennae and four lilac wings tipped in dusty rose, resting on a weathered plank in front of a sunlit stone wall, leaves at the edge of the frame.
IllustrationA generated picture. A crop of the butterfly's card picture, on the same scale as the photograph.
Photograph: the crocheted butterfly on a plain pale ground, turned slightly to one side, its beige head with two black eyes and two brown cord antennae between four lilac wings tipped in peach.
PhotographThe toy itself. Turned a little, in the maker's own yarn, so the colours differ.

Translated from the same record

Every pattern comes in English, English (UK), Deutsch, Español, Français, Nederlands, and Українська.

The rounds are not translated by hand: they are written again from the same stitch record, in the crochet terms of each language, so a count cannot change on the way.

From the Pocket Butterfly Round 3 in two languages

LanguageRound 3Count
English
US terms		[sc, inc] 6 times.18 sts
Deutsch
Deutsche Begriffe		[1 fM, 1 Zun] 6-mal.18 M

This pattern in English · Deutsch · English (UK) · Español · Français · Nederlands · Українська

After publication

I collect feedback from testers and from everyone who makes a pattern, and improve the pattern from it. When a published pattern changes in a way you would notice, its page says what changed and whether a toy you have already made comes out differently. Updates are free: you get every later version at no extra cost, and every pattern carries a version, so you know which one you have.

From the Pocket Butterfly The version you would download

Version 0.3.3