Un-Poppable Balloon

This year my son decided he wanted to be Georgie from Stephen King’s It.  Great!  Another easy costume to pull together!  I had originally thought to make a paper mache balloon for him to carry (a real helium balloon was just asking to get let go and I so didn’t want to deal with that breakdown).  Then I got more and more afraid that he would drop it and break it or that I wouldn’t be able to hold the balloon upright without making a hole in it… so I decided just to go ahead and make one!  Of course there wasn’t a pattern readily available because how many people think to make a large balloon out of crochet?  So, here’s my It balloon pattern…. written as a amigurumi style pattern.

Note: This balloon is big.  Like adult head size. You could decrease the amount of increase rounds then decrease the sc and decrease, sc rounds by the exact same and it will work out fine.

Note:  As I was making this it made me think that this would be awesome in blue or pink for a baby gift…

G hook or whatever you usually use to keep the polyfil from showing
worsted weight yarn in color of choice, I used red that I had in my stash (which feels like some scratchy Red Heart basic) and white for the lettering
polyfil
dowel of whatever length you want
Duck Tape (I had dark blue and not black so I just used that.  Wrapping it around the dowel helps with the stability)
Super Glue (to keep the balloon from sliding)
option red ribbon (I plan on doing this after we use it for Halloween just in the attempt to keep at least one thing off his floor)
6sc in magic circle
*inc* around
*inc, sc* around
*inc, 2 sc* around
*inc, 3 sc* around
*inc, 4 sc* around
*inc, 5 sc* around
*inc, ,6 sc* around
*inc, ,7 sc* around
*inc, ,8 sc* around
*inc, ,9 sc* around
*inc, ,10 sc* around
*inc, ,11 sc* around
*inc, ,12 sc* around
*inc, ,13 sc* around
*inc, ,14 sc* around
*inc, ,15 sc* around
sc around for 15 rounds
*dec, 15 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 14 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 13 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 12 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 11 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 10 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 9 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 8 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 7 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 6 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 5 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 4 sc* around
sc around
Make sure you go ahead and stuff the balloon and insert the dowel.  Try to get the dowel in just under a little bit of stuffing at the top of the balloon.  Stuff around the dowel… The next few rows you will work around the dowel closing in the balloon and keep stuffing as you go.  It’s awkward, but it works.
*dec, 3 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 2 sc* around
sc around
*dec, 1 sc* around
sc around
dec around
sc around
sc around
bind off, weave in end
This is where the super glue comes in.  Drop a few drops to where you closed in. This keeps the balloon from sliding off the dowel.
There you have it.  A big balloon that won’t pop!
Mad Hooking!