The Christmas Pickle Tradition
The “Christmas pickle” is a well-known holiday ornament tradition in parts of the US and Germany: a pickle-shaped ornament is hidden among the other decorations on a Christmas tree, and the first child (or family member) to spot it on Christmas morning traditionally gets a small prize or the honor of opening the first gift. A crochet pickle ornament pattern fits into this tradition as a handmade alternative to the glass or plastic pickle ornaments sold around the holidays.
What We Could (and Couldn’t) Verify
We weren’t able to find a usable, detailed written pattern for a crochet pickle ornament in our research for this article — the search results we found pointed to a Ravelry listing, a Pinterest pin, and a YouTube video, none of which gave us enough extracted content to describe specific stitch counts or a designer’s exact approach with confidence. Rather than invent a pattern and present it as real, we’re going to describe the general construction logic you’d expect for this shape, and recommend searching directly on Ravelry, Etsy, or YouTube for a complete, specific written or video pattern before you start.
The General Shape a Pickle Ornament Amigurumi Would Use
An amigurumi pickle would most likely follow the same core logic used across this collection for any elongated novelty shape: starting from a magic ring, increasing over a few rounds to reach the pickle’s width, working a longer stretch of even rounds to build the length of the body, and optionally adding a very slight taper or bumpy texture (some pickle-shaped designs use small bobble stitches or surface texture to suggest the bumpy pickle skin) before closing the ends. This is general amigurumi shaping knowledge rather than a specific pattern we’ve verified — see our beginner’s guide to amigurumi for more on how increase/decrease shaping works in general.
Finishing as an Ornament
Whatever specific pattern you follow, finishing a piece as a hanging ornament typically means adding a small loop of yarn, cord, or ribbon at one end before or during the final stuffing and closing steps, so it can be hung on a tree branch. This is the same basic finishing step used for other small ornament-style projects in this collection.
Other Small Ornament-Style Patterns
If you can’t find a complete pickle pattern you’re happy with, our tiny crochet ball pattern guide and crochet berries pattern guide cover two other small, round novelty shapes that work well as quick ornaments, and our Grinch crochet pattern guide covers a more involved holiday character project if you want something bigger.