Are you looking for a quick, satisfying project that you can finish in 15 or 20 minutes? Crocheted fruit slices are the ultimate "instant gratification" craft. They are excellent for beginners looking to practice working in the round and changing colors, but they are equally fun for seasoned crocheters who need a quick gift or a market stall filler.
You're more than welcome to use this pattern for your personal uses or selling the final product, but please refrain from selling the pattern. Credit me if you share photos too, I'd love to see what you come up with!
For this pattern, it's a simple, universal one that can be adapted to create lemons, limes, oranges, watermelons, and even dragon fruit just by swapping your color palette and sewing in seeds. The pattern is worked in rounds, then folded in half (depending on the fruit!). Let’s dive into the materials you need to get started.
Stitches and Materials:
- Magic ring (MR)
- Single crochet (sc)
- Increase (inc) - Two sc in the same stitch, increasing the count per row by 1 stitch.
- Crochet hook size 3.75mm or 4mm (I used 4mm previously, but have since swapped to a 3.75mm for a slightly tighter stitch)
- Yarn weight 4 in various colours
Let's start with the base pattern.
- sc6 in a MR (6)
- inc6 (12)
- inc12 (24)
- (sc3, inc)6 (30)
- (sc4, inc)6 (36)
- sc36 (36)
- Fold piece in half and sc around the edge, sealing the piece shut. If leaving the piece as a whole circular slice, skip this step. (18)
- Fasten off and weave in any loose ends.
Now that you understand the base pattern, let's move onto our first fruit as a demonstration - a lemon!
Yarn colours: Yellow and white.
- In yellow yarn. sc6 in a MR (6)
- inc6 (12)
- inc12 (24)
- (sc3, inc)6 (30)
- (sc4, inc)6 (36).
- In white, sc36 (36)
- Fold piece in half and in yellow, sc around the edge, sealing the piece shut. If leaving the piece as a whole circular slice, skip this step. (18)
- Using white, sew the "membrane wall" (the white part separating the segments in the fruit). Fasten off and weave in any loose ends.
Congratulations on finishing your first fruit slice! Let's look at some other variations that I've made and the colour swaps you'll have to make:
Orange - (Orange, Yellow) The exact same pattern as the lemon example above, but replace yellow with orange yarn.
Apple - (Light Yellow, Red) Use a very light yellow until round 8., where you'll swap to red to sew it in half.
Watermelon - (Red, White, Dark Green, Black) Start with red, swap to white for round 6, and swap to dark green for round 7. Finally, using black yarn, sew in the seeds onto round 3 with the seeds facing towards the center of the semicircle.
Kiwi - (Green, Brown, Black) Start with green, and swap to brown for round 6. Don't go further, fasten off and weave in here. Use black to sew seeds aimed towards the center of the circle on round 2.
Dragonfruit - (White, Red/Pink, Black) Start with white, then swap to red for round 6. Don't go further, fasten off and weave in here. Use black to sew seeds randomly within the white inside of the circle.
I hope this tutorial helped you feel more confident with color changes and increasing in the round. Remember, you can create nearly any fruit using this pattern and a bit of creativity. I personally prefer to sell them in a small kit for children to play pretend with, but you can sew them onto tote bags, attach them as a keychain, string them up for a nursery mobile, or go further and make the circle bigger, then use them as coasters. Go wild! Tag me in your creations, I'd love to see them!