Sunflower Crochet Keychain
Sunflowers don't do subtle, and neither does this keychain. It's a flat brown seed head, a thin ring of yellow, twelve long pointed petals and one green leaf peeking out at the top right, all small enough to sit in your palm. It hangs from the tip of a petal, the way a real flower head tips on its stem. If you can make a magic ring and work sc in the round, you can make it in about an hour.
| At a glance | |
|---|---|
| Size | about 3¼ in (8 cm) across, plus the leaf |
| Time | about an hour |
| Yarn | DK cotton in brown, yellow and green, about 22 yd in all |
| Hook | 2.5 mm |
| Pieces | three pieces: the flower, a leaf and a back disc. No stuffing. |
What makes it look like a sunflower, not a daisy
My crochet daisy flower keychain is its cousin, but a sunflower needs three things a daisy doesn't. A flat, wide seed head, about half the width of the flower: the brown circle increases on every round, with no plain round to lift it into a dome. A thin yellow ring between the seeds and the petals, like on a real sunflower. In numbers: a flat brown circle grows to 30 sts, and one yellow round brings it to 36.
And long petals with a point. A fan of stitches with a picot on top sounds right, but it comes out wide and round, more like a marigold. These petals start as a chain of 4 with stitches worked back down it. An outline round then goes up one side, around the tip with a picot, and back down, which gives each petal its point and a faint line down the middle.
Yarn, hook and the little hardware
- Yarn: DK #3 cotton. I like Paintbox Yarns Cotton DK: it has a warm yellow, a good chocolate brown and plenty of greens, and cotton keeps the petal tips sharp. Per sunflower, by my estimate from the stitch count with tails for sewing: about 4 yd of brown, 16 yd of yellow and 2 yd of green.
- Hook: 2.5 mm, small for DK on purpose so the seed head stays firm and flat.
- Hardware: a split key ring with a short chain, an open jump ring of 7 to 8 mm, and two pairs of flat or chain-nose pliers.
- Small things: a stitch marker, a tapestry needle, a sewing pin and scissors.
Tension. Aim for about 6 sc per inch (2.5 cm), tight enough that the circles lie flat and firm. At that tension the brown center comes out about 1½ in (4 cm) across and the whole flower about 3¼ in (8 cm) across. Those are estimates from the counts, so measure yours.
Stitches (US terms): magic ring (MR), chain (ch), slip stitch (sl st), single crochet (sc), half double crochet (hdc), double crochet (dc), increase (inc, 2 sc in the same st), skip (sk), and a picot: ch 2, sl st in the 2nd ch from the hook. R stands for round, st for stitch. The brown rounds are a continuous spiral, so move your marker up each round. The yellow rounds are joined with a sl st. Stitch counts are in parentheses.
Making the sunflower, one color at a time
Brown: the seed head
Make 1. This is the start of the flower piece.
- R1: MR, 6 sc in the ring. (6) Pull the ring closed.
- R2: inc × 6. (12)
- R3: (sc, inc) × 6. (18)
- R4: (sc 2, inc) × 6. (24)
- R5: (sc 3, inc) × 6. (30)
Sl st in the next st. Cut the brown, leaving a 4 in (10 cm) tail, and join the yellow with a sl st in the same st.
Yellow: the ring and the petals
- R6: ch 1, (sc 4, inc) × 6, sl st in the first sc. (36)
Work the first sc into the same st as the join, then lay the circle down.
Tip: check it's flat now. The petals will only make a cup worse. If it cups like a bowl, redo R6 with a 3 mm hook. If it ruffles, redo it with a 2.25 mm hook.
The petals. Don't cut the yarn.
- R7: [ch 4, sc in the 2nd ch from the hook, hdc in the next ch, dc in the next ch, sk 2 sts, sl st in the next st] × 12. (12 petals)
That's 12 petals, each sitting on 3 sts of R6. Start the first petal from the sl st that joined R6, so the last sl st of R7 lands back in that same st. The first chain of each petal is the turning chain: it becomes the pointed tip. The petals look thin and spiky for now. That's normal.
The outline. Each petal has two sides: the free loops at the bottom of its chain on one side, and the tops of the 3 sts you just made on the other.
- R8: [3 sc up the free loops of the petal's chain, (sc, picot, sc) in the tip, 3 sc down the tops of the petal's sts, sl st in the sl st between petals] × 12. (12 petals outlined)
Sl st to the first sc, fasten off and weave in the end on the back. Each petal is now about ¾ in (2 cm) long, about as wide as a pinky finger.
Tip: round tips mean the wrong side. Always go up the free-loop side first, then count 3 sc up, (sc, picot, sc) at the tip, 3 sc down. Ch 2 snugly for the picot. If the petals curl, the chains of R7 were too tight: a 3 mm hook for those 4 chains fixes it.
Hold the flower face up and pick the top petal, the one it will hang from. I like it a little left of center. Put a stitch marker in its picot.
Green: the leaf
Make 1. It's worked on both sides of a chain.
Leave a 6 in (15 cm) starting tail and ch 9.
- Side 1: starting in the 2nd ch from the hook, sl st, sc, hdc, dc in each of the next 2 ch, hdc, sc, 3 sc in the last ch. (10)
- Side 2: working along the free loops on the other side of the chain, sc, hdc, dc in each of the next 2 ch, hdc, sc, sl st. (7)
Sl st in the first sl st, fasten off and weave that end into the leaf. The sl st end, where your hook started, is the pointed tip. The 3 sc end is the rounded base: that's the slip knot end, so the starting tail hangs from it, ready for sewing. The leaf is about 1½ in (4 cm) long.
Yellow again: the back disc, with the leaf in between
Back disc (yellow). Make 1. It's the same circle as the flower without its petals.
- R1: MR, 6 sc in the ring. (6)
- R2: inc × 6. (12)
- R3: (sc, inc) × 6. (18)
- R4: (sc 2, inc) × 6. (24)
- R5: (sc 3, inc) × 6. (30)
- R6: (sc 4, inc) × 6. (36)
Sl st in the next st and fasten off, leaving a 14 in (35 cm) tail.
Sew the leaf on. Do it before the disc, while you can still see where it goes.
- Hold the sunflower face up, with the marked petal at the top left.
- Slide the leaf's base behind the next petal to the right of the marked one, tip pointing up and to the right. Its base should reach R6, and about half of the leaf should show beyond the petals. Pin it.
- Turn the flower over. With the leaf's starting tail, sew its base to the back of R6 with 4 or 5 small stitches, keeping them in the back of the stitches. Hide the end.
Close the back. Lay the disc on the back of the flower, right side out, its edge on the back of R6: 36 sts on 36 sts. The leaf base is now sandwiched in between. With the disc's tail, whipstitch all the way around, one stitch in each st, going through the leaf where it sits between the layers. That seam is what keeps the leaf from flopping forward. Hide the end between the two layers.
Hanging it from a petal tip
- Open the jump ring sideways with the pliers, twisting one end toward you and the other away. Never pull the ends apart.
- Slide it through the tip of the marked petal, under the picot and the petal's turning chain just below it, so it holds two layers of yarn. Take the marker out.
- Add the end link of the keychain chain and twist the jump ring closed until the ends meet with no gap.
Hold it up by the ring and give it a few firm tugs. If the picot stretches, sew 3 or 4 tight stitches around the jump ring through the tip with a short yellow strand.
Safety. The metal jump ring and key ring make this a keychain, not a toy: keep it away from children under 3.
A little bunch of three
Real sunflowers aren't only yellow, and only the yarn changes. I like a set of three on one big ring: the classic yellow, a pale lemon with a dark center, and a deep burgundy with a caramel center. Tie them with a scrap of twine and they make a lovely end-of-year present for a teacher.
And if you'd like one more flower on the ring, the daisy keychain worked in white sits beautifully next to this sunflower.
Hung a sunflower on your keys? Tag #wavodecrochet on Pinterest so I can see it.
Pattern by Clara Hartwell for Wavode. Questions? Email me at support@wavode.com.
