Hand Crochet for Babies 1942 Pinafore

The Petite Pinafore's actual title says, "Daddy's Pin-Up Girl in this Petite Pinafore" which is a little weird but it was the 40s. It has directions for "Toddler Sizes 2 and 3" and uses Royal Society Baby Pearl. Because this used a size 7 aka 1.65mm steel hook I assumed that size 10 thread would work too. I used some Knit Picks Curio thread that was on clearance in the color tangerine to make this. It took me about a month, working off and on while I started to learn to knit.

They give a gauge of 2 shells and 4 rows equals 3/4 inch; 11 1/2 single crochets equal 1 inch.  
To start they tell you to make a chain about 24 inches saying that 11 chains stitches should make an inch. Then single crochet in the second chain from the hook and work across until there are 248 stitches, cut off the remaining chain. This absolutely did not work for me. The thread I used gave me a gauge of 8 stitches per inch. If I have a chain of 24 inches then I need somewhere around 192 single crochets before I get to the end of the row. The shell gauge was right on though so I'm not sure if this is an error in the pattern or if I just make big single crochets. Once I got going this was pretty simple but because it was thread it wasn't very fast to make.

The photo makes it look more gathered than it really was. There were no increases beyond the first row of shells that you worked into the single crochet stitches. I looked a little closer to the photo and I think they just arranged it with some folds.

I separated the straps in the front a little more than they did and I used the button cover pattern that I shared in January to cover the back button to make it match.

Overall this went fine even if I couldn't match the gauge (which isn't included in the scoring anymore). I think this will go to the county fair in a child-other garment category.

Scoring:
Is the pattern easy to understand? The first part about making a chain a measured length and then giving a number of single crochets was odd.  Shouldn't it be one or the other? I'm fine with working to a measurement. The length of this is done until you get to 9 inches for the smaller size. Since the gauge was a critical piece of the pattern it's getting marked down for the confusion. 0.75
Does it look like the photo? Yes, or it would if I'd put the straps closer together. 1.0
Would someone wear this? Yes. 1.0
Did I enjoy making this? Yes. Some thread stitches start to wear on my hands (like triple crochets for some reason). This was done in single and double crochets and the stitch pattern was easy to remember and didn't hurt my hands. 1.0

Total score = 3.75