Character Name: Alice Dyer
Fandom: The Magnus Protocol [Podcast]
Voiced By: Billie Hindle
Yarn Used:
Sandals: CraftSmart Value - Coffee
Skin: CraftSmart Value - Peach
Leggings: CraftSmart Value - Ivy
Tunic: CraftSmart Value - Turquoise Mint
Hair: CraftSmart Value - Curry
Stripe: CraftSmart Value - Purple
Mouth: Loops & Threads Soft Classic - Neon Pink
Glasses: Ashland 12 Gauge Decorative Wire - Gold + Aunt Lydia’s Crochet Cotton - Wasabi
Basic pattern here.
Look. You can’t NOT love Alice. It’s basically illegal. She’ll be the first to tell you so, actually. I didn’t expect to love her as much as I do, let alone for her to be the first Protocol character I crocheted, but here we are. I’m working my ass off to get her done before the next mid-season hiatus, but we’ll see; I’m writing this paragraph after having only finished the first leg. Goddamn does she need a hug, though. [Crafter’s note: Not only did I finish her in time for the public release of Episode 20, I finished her in time for Pride Night at the local ballpark, so go me.]
I wasn’t entirely sure how I was going to do her, actually; the podcast is still relatively new and we don’t know anything about her physically other than that she’s trans, so I’m still getting an idea in my head for how she looks. Or I thought I was. But as I crocheted, a design…emerged. She differs from the base pattern as follows:
Shoes: I decided to give Alice sandals. (Was I thinking of a clip I saw from an old game of Super Password where the clue someone gave was “those ugly shoes that lesbians wear” and the other person immediately got that the answer was “Birkenstocks”? Mmmmaybe.) They…didn’t turn out necessarily as well as I’d hoped, but they work. Sort of. Anyway, I stitched two stitches in the brown on either side of the toe, then at the top of the foot did an ankle strap to tie it all together. Should have given her painted toenails, in retrospect, but eh…
Leggings: Alice’s attire could go two ways, in my mind. She could wear neat, tailored, neutral-colored business attire at all opportunities, or she could be an OH THANK GOD THERE ARE ACTUAL COLOR OPTIONS IN MY CLOTHING kind of trans woman, and frankly I crochet enough neutral business suits. Besides, she very much gives off “what are you gonna do, fire me?” vibes, so she’s not going to worry about if there’s a dress code in the office. So, bright green leggings! I gave her a row of skin between the ankles and the leggings, but other than that they’re done exactly like Joseph’s pants.
Tunic: Okay, it’s somewhere between a tunic and a dress, but whatever. I did R36 in the front loops of R35, then R37 in the back loops of R36, then continued the same as normal for the upper torso. I did give her a little bit of a V-neck in the last couple rounds. The hem was done as follows:
R1: Join yarn to middle back of R36, ch 1, sc in each front loop around, sl st in first sc (36 sc).
R2-3: Ch 1, [sc in first 6 st, hdc in next st, dc in next st, trc in next st, dtrc in next st, trc in next st, dc in next st, hdc in next st, sc in next 5 st] 2 times, sl st in first sc (22 sc, 4 hdc, 4 dc, 4 trc, 2 dtrc).
R4: Ch 1, sc in first 9 st, hdc in next st, sc in next 17 st, hdc in next st, sc in next 8 st, sl st in first sc (34 sc, 2 hdc).
R5: [Sl st in first 9 st, ch 1, dc in next st, ch 1, sl st in next 7 st] 2 times. Fasten off.
Head: I caved. I didn’t want to bother with the fur stitch, so instead I just stitched her scalp on as normal and then went back and used the loop method to hook in individual colors. On the other hand, doing it that way meant I could give her some funky stripes in her hair, so I gave her a purple streak because why the fuck not. I also gave her ears so her glasses would stay on. Basically, I did two chains on either side of the head to anchor them, then did three hdcs in each ch, then sl st the outside edges and joined the lobes to the head. (Also, just as a side note - the mouth is technically the same yarn as the rest of Alice; it’s the Michaels store brand, essentially. They rebranded their yarn a couple months back.)
Arms: I was trying to give her bell sleeves, but I don’t think they turned out quite the way I had them in mind. Anyway, I worked her arms in the skin color up to R12, then switched to the tunic color and did R13 in front loops only, R14 in back loops only, and continued up the arm. Once they were done, I went back to R13, joined the yarn back onto the loop, and:
R1: Ch 1, sc in front loop of each st around, sl st in first sc (12 sc).
R2: Ch 1, sc in first 2 st, hdc in next 2 st, dc in next 4 st, hdc in next 2 st, sc in next 2 st, sl st in first sc (4 sc, 4 hdc, 4 dc).
R3: Ch 1, sc in each st around, sl st in first sc (12 sc).
Glasses: They’re…wobblier than I would have liked, but that’s just because I was working with the wire for the first time and I kinda cut it shorter than I should have. (I wanted them to be square.) Anyway, I had skimmed a book of various doll parts that I will likely be obtaining at some point (it had a pattern for a wheelchair in it even!), and its suggestion for glasses was to make them out of wire and then wrap them in embroidery floss. I’m not sure what happened to my embroidery floss, but I have lots and lots of crochet thread handy leftover from last year’s still unfinished whoops shut up temperature blanket, so I grabbed one at random. It happened to be Wasabi, so Alice has green glasses and y’all are just going to have to live with that.