Most people tell me that they’ve got a handle on the crocheting part… but when it comes to assembling amigurumi pieces, they dread it! That makes me sniffle… making amigurumi should be 100% fun!

So, in this post, I’ll show you how to attach limbs easily and evenly… taking all the stress out of sewing. The trick to easy attaching is planning out your placement ahead of time. It’s a piece of cake after that!

Plan where to attach your limbs

I’m making Jackie the Cow and I’m about to attach the legs and arms.

The instructions say, “Attach legs to rounds 9-14.”

Of course, this is just a suggestion! You can attach limbs wherever you’d like… but I’ve told you where I attach mine so there’s no guesswork on your part!

What you want to do is find out where round 9 is, and place a locking stitch marker there. Start counting (see the ridges?) from the center:

Count until you’re at round 9, and place a marker. Place another at round 14. Now you know where your leg should be located on the body!

If you find that your pieces tend to move around a lot when attaching, you might want to go one step further and use locking stitch markers to hold your piece in place. The more you prepare your pieces, the easier sewing will be!

Stuff your limbs

Grab some Polyfill and stuff your limbs:

I like to stuff both legs at once, so I can be sure they are the same size:

Sewing!

It’s not as hard as you think… I promise! We’re going to use a simple whipstitch to attach the limbs… the important thing is to let your guides (the rows and stitch markers) do all the fancy work!

Thread the needle

To begin: thread a tapestry needle with the long tail of a leg. As the first step, I like to hide the knot… so I run my needle through the first stitch on the leg:

This hides the knot beautifully! See?

Whipstitch!

The leg that we’re attaching has 24 stitches. So, if we attach along 6 stitches to round 9, 6 stitches going up to round 14, 6 stitches on round 14, and then 6 stitches going back down to round 9… the leg will be attached evenly! So, begin by threading the needle through one stitch on the body and one stitch on the leg:

That’s it! You did a whipstitch! Check out this little video if you want to see it in action:

Continue to do 6 stitches on round 9… and then continue stitching (sorta turning 90 degrees) to get to round 14. See? You’re using the stitches on the body to guide you! Easy!

As long as you keep attaching one stitch of the body to one stitch of the leg, you’ll stay on track!

Continue all the way around, and tie a knot on the inside of your work.

Ta da!

Repeat for second leg

Now, at this point, you may want to get picky. See how there’s a jog in the leg where the colors changed?

If that jog bothers you… no problem! Just decide where to place your second leg so that the jog ends up at the back of the cow! See… I’m going to put my second leg over here (on the other side of the jog), leaving the color change nearly invisible:

Now attach the second leg… same as the first! Don’t forget to place your helpful markers if you need them!

Repeat for arms!

You’ve got it down, now! Attach the arms using the same method!

You did it!

That wasn’t so bad, was it?

Other Ways to Attach Limbs

There are a few other ways to attach limbs to crocheted softies – each gives a different look.

Does your pattern tell you the flatten the piece and then attach it? Then click over here for this tutorial. 🙂

Does your pattern tell you to attach the piece with single crochet as you stitch? That’s my favorite way to attach limbs. The pattern will say sc-attach and you can find a video tutorial for that method here. This method works great for flopp[y limbs that are attached along a single row of the design.

Here are handy links to all the posts about attaching parts. . .

• How to Attach Limbs to Amigurumi
• How to Attach Amigurumi Arms and Legs with Single Crochet
• Tips for Attaching Amigurumi Features
• Which Loop Do You Use When Attaching Pieces?
• How to Attach Nicely Rounded Amigurumi Pieces
• How to Give Your Amigurumi a Shapely Neck
• How to Attach a Flattened Piece to Amigurumi
• How to Attach a Folded Ear to Amigurumi
• How to Attach a Folded Ear to Two Rounds
• How to Attach Flat Spots Using Running Stitch
• How to Attach with Single Crochet
• Tips for Attaching a Dress to Your Doll

Return to the main table of contents for Let’s Learn to Crochet Amigurumi.

Move on to the lessons about faces and details.

Happy stitching!

In amigurumi patterns, you’ll often see the instructions ‘Fasten off’ or ‘Fasten off with a long tail’. What does that mean? No worries, I’m here to tell you!

Fasten off.

Whenever you’re making a piece, and you’ve finished all the crocheting… you’ve got to end it! Even though the instruction ‘fasten off’ may sound a little obscure, it’s super-easy (and you’ve probably already been doing it)!

I’ve got a video here, followed by some step-by-step photos for if you just need a quick reference.

Here’s the video

And here’s the photo tutorial

Here’s my snout from my cow (because I’m doing the CAL!), and I’ve finished crocheting:

Remove your hook, making the last loop a little larger:

Now, pull the working yarn through the loop (you can either cut the yarn- see the next part of this blog post first- or pass the entire skein through the loop. Up to you!).

Check out that beautiful knot:

How much tail should you leave?

Excellent question! When you’re cutting your yarn when you’re fastening off), you always want to leave a few inches or so. That way, you’ll have enough to weave in (or hide) the tail on your finished piece.

When making amigurumi, you often want to leave a ‘long tail’… enough so that you can use the tail to attach the piece to another piece later on. I usually say about 12″, but a more accurate measurement is about twice as long as the last round of your piece.

Here’s the step-by-step:

Keep in mind, you can cut your working yarn while tying off the knot (see above) or after the knot has been fastened. Simply snip your yarn (leaving the length I described):

And you’ve done it!

How’s your cow coming?

(It’s not too late to join in! Read all about our Cow CAL here!)

Last time, I showed you that I finished up my cow’s head a couple days ago, and now I’ve finished the body, arms and legs, as well:

Pretty rainbow-y, huh?

On Thursday, I’ll show you how to slip stitch and half double crochet, two stitches you’ll need for crocheting the snout!

Here are handy links to all the posts about closing up the stuffing opening and fastening off in amigurumi. . .

• How to Close Up Your Stuffing Opening – Drawstring Method (Wendi’s favorite)
• How to Stitch Up Those Last Few Rounds (Stacey’s favorite)
• How to Fasten Off Amigurumi
• How to Tie a Knot in Amigurumi

Return to the main table of contents for Let’s Learn to Crochet Amigurumi.

Move on to the lessons for attaching parts.

Happy stitching!

How’s your cow (for the FreshStitches CAL) coming along?

You already know that I’m making a rainbow cow… basically, changing to a new color every few rows to get rainbow-y stripes.

Do you want to know how to change colors?

Of course you do!

So, I made this little video of me doing the first color change: (click on the square icon in the lower right corner of the video to view it in full screen)

Not so hard, is it?

And if you keep changing colors every few rounds, you’ll end up with a super-fun, stripey head!

Want to get a little fancier? There’s a way to change colors and minimize the look of the little “step” that results. Watch that video here.

Here are handy links to all the posts about changing yarn color in crochet. . .

• How to Change Colors in Single Crochet
• How to Crochet Stripes with Minimal Jog
• How to Crochet with Two Colors – Stranding
• How to Strand Short Color Changes
• Tips for Working Long Color Changes in Crochet
• How to Do Barbershop Striping in Crochet
• How to Crochet in Joined Rounds

Return to the main table of contents for Let’s Learn to Crochet Amigurumi.

Move on to the lessons about crocheting stuffed animals in different sizes.

Happy stitching!