3. Knitting Instructions

There are no set-in-stone dimensions and instructions for Blossom's handcrafted shell. You should feel free to improvise and come up with your own form!

For reference here are two shells made in our lab, and their approximate dimensions. The left one is crocheted in a double-crochet spiral plus some extensions on the top and the right one is knitted.

For crocheting, we have found the following to be useful:

• Start at the bottom. The widest part should be about 21" in circumference. We started a little under, and increased the first two rows.
• Then you want to decrease stitches as you move up to the neck - this should be about 8" above the widest part, and be about 12-13" in circumference.
• Then you want to make a capped sphere spiral. This should again have a circumference of about 20". This site has a nice calculator for a full sphere. Start with the row with the stitch number of the neck.
• In the gray shell above, the bottom started at 80 double-crochet stitches, the neck is about 35 stitches around, and the widest head diameter about 60 stitches around. But these of course vary with your yarn, hook, and style.
• Stop about 2" above the center line (for us, it was 4 rows), and finish by continuing making a rectangle which will flap over to cover the head with enough clearance for the ears. The gray shell's flap is too narrow and exposes too much of the ear mechanism.

Then you can adorn your Blossom with a variety of patterns, flowers, buttons, and other attachments. Improvise and share your results!