Introduction: Hemp and Ribbon Crochet Jewelry

About: human, does many things

Crocheting hemp jewelry is a cheap, easy way or making unique gifts for family and friends. The same hemp jewelry you see in stores for $15 or more an be made at home for less than $5..all you need are some basic crochet skills!

I work at a library, and one of my fellow librarians loves making bracelets out of embroidery floss. When she made me a typical wrap-and-tie bracelet, I thought I'd reciprocate with something a little different. This specific instructable is for a bracelet, but I'll include techniques to easily adapt it to any type of jewelry. Only limited by your creativity!

Step 1: Materials

Materials:

-thin polished hemp, $5 at Wal-Mart
-length of ribbon. I used ribbon yarn from Big Lots, $1, but you can use any ribbon you like.
-size E crochet hook
-scissors.

If you like to use thicker hemp for chunkier jewelry, just increase the size of your crochet hook to compensate. You'll probably need wider ribbon, too, to thread through the thicker crochet at the end. Optionally, you can add beads, charms, pull-tabs from soda cans, whatever you like! Be creative with this.

Step 2: Beginning Chain

Using size E crochet hook, tie a slip knot with the hemp. Leave a tail about 4 inches long: this will be used to fasten the bracelet later.

For a bracelet, chain 30. For a ring, I chained 12, and for an ankle bracelet I did about 40. When you finish the beginning chain, wrap it around your wrist, and it should be just about an inch longer than the circumference you want your finished bracelet to be.

Step 3: Bracelet Body

Row 1: Single crochet into every link of this beginning chain.
Row 2: Turn, chain 2, double crochet into every stitch.
Repeat these two rows twice more, and then end with a row of single crochet. So you'll have a bracelet with five rows: sc, dc, sc, dc, sc.

To change how wide or narrow your bracelet is, just vary the bracelet body. You can thread ribbon through one or two rows of single crochet if you like a tin bracelet, or add even more rows for a thicker one. If you want to get really fancy, you can do special stitches, add a border to both edges, add beads...anything that needs to be put on the hemp itself should be added during this step.

Step 4: Adding Ribbon

Now, thread your ribbon through. For this, I used a piece of ribbon about three times as long as my bracelet. Pull the ends of the ribbon through the rows of double crochet, weaving it in and out between the stitches. When you come to the end, pull ribbon through one of the single crochet stitches and then continue weaving it through the next row of double crochet.

When I got to the end of this row, I had enough ribbon left over to thread the remainder through the center row of single crochet as well, to make three rows of ribbon, total. Feel free to change this up--run ribbon only through the single crochet rows, run it through all five, string the ribbon with beads while you weave it through, etc. I left ribbon hanging on each end of the bracelet, as you can see in the next step, to tie into a bow on the finished bracelet.

Step 5: Finishing and Attaching

To attach the bracelet, I simply took the loose end of hemp from the beginning chain and threaded it through a big needle, then sewed the two ends together on the wrist of the recipient, loose enough so she could slip it off if need be. If it gets a little tight, just put it in water, (especially warm water) and the hemp will expand.

You can see the loose ends of ribbon I left hanging from the bracelet. Once the bracelet was sewn on, I tied these in a bow and double-knotted the bow so it wouldn't come off.

Thread in any loose ends of hemp, wear, and enjoy!