Suzann ThompsonCrochet Bouquet: Easy Designs for Dozens of Flowers

I have had this book for a good long while now, and I absolutely *love* it and have used quite a few of these flowers to accent a wide range of projects, including a 3D wall hanging I made. I have not found problems in any of the patterns, and find it to be a solid, easily followed well done book that holds up over time.It has a versatile mix of more stylized, funky, and realistic flowers. The beginning material gives some explanations of some of the techniques you will need to know to create crochet flowers, but it does not go over how to do the basic crochet stitches. I don't find that to be a deficit simply because generally crochet flowers aren't the first place people start off when they are learning. However, if you're wanting your first crochet project to be something like thread flowers to stitch on your jeans, which this book does give a fairly easy pattern for one style of flower to do that with, I would recommend watching some video tutorials for the basic stitches and practicing on something far less exciting then your clothes, like washcloth, first. Otherwise, this is a super cool book that provides a number of useful flower and leaf patterns and it is one of my favorite crochet books.

This book,is fantastic! The patterns are easy to follow and quick to work up. You do need intermediate crochet skills, at least. And be able to read a pattern. The flowers work up quickly and don't use a lot of yarn. As I'm working through the book I have found only one issue with a pattern. It was easily fixed and the flowers turned out beautiful. They are the perfect size for embellishing hats, headbands, bags,etc... Some of the flowers are more realistic than others. I like the realistic ones, personally, and have made adaptations to the existing patterns to make them more so. Each page has great pictures and a list of supplies. It doesn't have any pattern diagrams which would be helpful at times. Some of the flowers are from afghan block patterns and some are not. The author has some really unique patterns for the realistic flowers. Daffodils, pansies, sunflowers, roses, mums, and poppies. There is great section just on leaves and stems which is really nice. A wide variety that after you play with them a bit can be adapted to fit whatever flower you make. There isn't a daffodil leaf, but the 75 birds and butterflies book has a pattern that adapts readily for those. ( also another awesome book) . I wanted a book to make flowers to embellish hats with and this book has been a complete delight! It has really met all my expectations and more!

This book is fun to look through. I really like the layout and photographs of each flower, and the font is clean and the patterns are easy to read. I've made just a few of the flowers because I don't crochet much, but the ones I've made all turned out nicely. "Loopy" was fun to make and easy to alter, and I made a couple of the Plain Vein leaves for use on a crochet purse. The projects in the book are good for ideas, too.I also like that each pattern is labeled as easy, intermediate, or experienced. At first I wanted these to be in sections, but the more I use the book the happier I am that the patterns are mixed in together. I don't feel "boxed in" by having to keep to a particular section by my skills and I'm more willing to try the harder flowers.I only gave the book four stars because I think a couple of things could be added to make it better. First, I'd like to know what size hook Suzann used for her flowers. I know this is a flexible thing and depends on me as well as my yarn choices, but the book lists the yarn used for each flower, so why not the hook size, too? It would be a useful starting point for my own creations.Also, I'd like to have charts. I've been crocheting for years from written instructions but I find that charts are very helpful, especially if you get stuck. Most of the flowers aren't so complicated as some motifs, but it could still be useful. Maybe they'd be ugly and spoil the look of the book, but they could be added in as an appendix.

I just received this book yesterday so I haven't made anything yet. However I have read through some of the instructions for the fabulous flowers, and they are clearly written and make sense. I found the flowers unusual and interesting as well as very pretty. But I particularly want to comment on the tremendous bonus of the beautiful beautiful leaves, including ferns, in the back of the book. There are a lot of different types of leaves and they are all wonderful.I don't understand a comment that I read stating that not all of the flowers featured on the cover have instructions in the book. They seem to all be there. The bottom right flower has green sepals with 5 "rays" and the sepal instructions have 6 "rays", but that is easily altered by chaining 5 instead of 6 and hdc 10 instead of 12. The author encourages variation and combining elements in different ways.This book has no crochet instructions which is fine. They are certainly easy to find elsewhere if you need them. Once you know the basics this book explains how to make dozens of lovely things!

Lots of fun flowers to make for anything to add something special