Octopus Keychain

This adorable little keychain has been a hit at markets and cons. It's worked as a single piece, so you only need to sew on the keychain in the end. I like to attach a few small rings to the D-ring of the clasp. The exact sizes of the rings and type of clasp are up to you. For the eyes, I just used a little bit of black yarn of the same weight as the body, but you can use safety eyes instead.

While you can stick to a single color, you can also easily make it striped. I made various Pride variants (color choices coming soon). The pattern is written as joined rounds to make the stripes look more even. For a single color, you can skip the chains at the beginning and the joins at the end of rounds 1-10.

Steps

Yarn weight: super fine

Hook size: 2.5 mm

Abbreviations (US crochet terms)

ch chain
hdc half-double crochet
sc single crochet
sc dec single crochet decrease (I prefer the "invisible" decrease: insert hook into next two front loops, yarn over, pull through, yarn over, pull through both loops.)
sc inc single crochet increase (two single crochets in the same stitch)
sl st slip stitch
st stitch

Tip for striped variants:

Crochet over the start and end tails to avoid weaving in many ends.
If the top color is different from the bottom color, leaving a long starting tail for attaching the keychain.

Round 1: In a magic ring, ch1, 6sc, join with the ch. (6)

Round 2: ch1, sc inc x 6, join. (12)

Round 3: ch1, (sc, sc inc) x 6, join. (18)

Round 4: ch1, (sc, sc inc, sc) x 6, join. (24)

Rounds 5-10: ch1, sc x 24, join. (24)

Round 11: In the front loops of round 10, (2 sl st, ch6, 3 hdc in 2nd ch from the hook, 3 hdc in each remaining ch, sl st in next front loop of round 10) x 8.

Round 12: In the back loops of round 10, (sc, sc dec, sc) x6 (18).

Note: Since you are working in the back loops, the decrease should use the back loops instead of the front loops.

Round 13: (sc, sc dec) x 6. (12)

Stuff the body with fiber fill.

Round 14: sc dec x 6. (6)

Break yarn, leaving a long tail. Sew the hole shut and weave the tail along the back of the body to the top. (If you left a long tail at the top, leave a shorter tail and weave it in at the bottom.)

Embroider two eyes in round 7, three stitches apart, using black superfine yarn, two strands per eyes.

Attach the keychain with the long tail.

Break yarn, leaving a long tail. Sew the hole shut and weave the tail along the back of the body to the top. (If you left a long tail at the top, leave a shorter tail and weave it in at the bottom.)

Embroider two eyes in round 7, three stitches apart, using black superfine yarn, two strands per eyes.

Attach the keychain with the long tail.