Crochet Basics for Amigurumi
Learn the essential hook grips, stitches, and tension control needed to turn yarn into your very first project. Progress step-by-step from loose foundation chains to seamless 3D spheres ready for stuffing.
Like Duolingo, but for Crochet Basics for Amigurumi. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
A short one: 12 levels across 2 sections, about 24 minutes end to end, roughly 5 days at five minutes a day. It moves through First Loops and Flat Stitches and Working in the Round to Build 3D Shapes. It starts from scratch.
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Key ideas in Crochet Basics for Amigurumi
- Knife grip and pencil grip are both valid; comfort and wrist leverage decide which you use
- The hook's throat (the open notch) needs to face toward you or slightly downward so it can snag the yarn and pull it through loops without snagging on the way out
- Yarn tension works like a gentle brake, letting yarn feed smoothly as you stitch
- Weaving the yarn around fingers (like over the index finger and between other fingers) provides controlled friction, whereas clenching a fist locks the yarn and strains your hand
- A slipknot creates an adjustable starting loop that determines the initial loop size
- The loop must sit on the round barrel (shaft) of the hook to achieve the true 5.0 mm diameter, sliding easily without squeezing tight into the throat or getting stuck
- Yarn over (yo) requires bringing the working yarn from behind and over top of the hook
- The hook's throat catches the strand, and you rotate the hook slightly downward to draw it cleanly through the loop already resting on the barrel
- Cotton yarn has very little natural stretch, so tight chains will not give when worked into
- Stitches formed only at the narrow tip/throat instead of sliding over the 5.0 mm barrel turn out too small, causing curling and making it hard to insert the hook for the next row
- First, slide the hook through the target stitch from front to back
- Second, catch the yarn with your hook and draw it through to end up with two loops on the hook
- Third, wrap the yarn over the hook again and pull through both resting loops to close the stitch
- The top of a finished crochet stitch looks like a flat 'V' or braid made of two parallel strands
- Inserting the hook underneath both strands of that 'V' anchors the stitch securely and produces a smooth, uniform fabric
- Catching only one loop creates decorative ridges or loose gaps instead of standard solid fabric
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives Crochet Basics for Amigurumi the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
As you get ready to stitch, which direction should the hook's throat (the open notch) face?
Get it right to open this lesson and 11 more in the app.
Where Crochet Basics for Amigurumi takes you
- 1
First Loops and Flat Stitches
- Grip, Tension, and the Foundation Chain
- The Single Crochet Stitch
- 2
Working in the Round to Build 3D Shapes
- The Magic Ring and Spiral Rounds
- Shaping, Stuffing, and Closing a Toy Sphere
2 sections · 4 units · 12 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
Tomo is in ChatGPT
Tomo is also a ChatGPT plugin: the same playable courses, built and played inside your chat.
Add Tomo to ChatGPT- What to ask
- “Make me a Tomo course on black holes.” “Turn this chat into a Tomo course.”
- What you get
- Quick questions with instant feedback, hearts and stars, ready to play in about a minute.
- Where it goes
- No sign-up to start. Connect your Tomo account and your streak carries on in the app.
You pick the voice
Crochet Basics for Amigurumi is taught in the Bestie style: your friend who just gets it. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start Crochet Basics for Amigurumi today.
Download Tomo, search Crochet Basics for Amigurumi, and play your first lesson in under a minute.