PROS

• You can make plushies, clothing, blankets, and so much more!

• Instead of buying stuff at the store, you can make it yourself! (Even though you're probably going to spend more money on materials than just buying the item)

• It's a very fun hobby that makes you feel super accomplished

• Crocheting can actually help ease things like depression or grief, and other things similar to that!

CONS

• Crocheting for too long can cause many pain-issues, such as in the shoulder, back, wrists, elbows, hands and you can also get headaches

• Crocheting is a pretty expensive hobby, since not only do you have to pay for yarn, but you have to buy other things, such as crochet hooks, stitch markers, yarn needles, and many other things. Especially when your main hobby is crocheting, you'll be running out of yarn faster than you can say, "Crochet."

• Crocheting is a very time consuming hobby. Many things can take hours, days, weeks, months, years (talking about temperature blankets) to make. But, this can be a pro or con depending on how you take it. For example, if you're looking for a long-term project to work on, or something to get you through a few hours, crocheting would be good choice of a hobby. But if you want a hobby that you can do very quickly, this may not be for you.

That's all! Another thing that is annoying, but doesn't affect the hobby itself, is that crocheting is often overlooked. What I mean is that knitting is far more known than crocheting, so you could be crocheting something and someone could be like, "What are you knitting?" I mean, I completely understand, I mean I had no clue what crocheting was not even two years ago, but I do wish crocheting was more well known!

Overall, I think if you want to get into crocheting, it's definitely worth it! But, just as a warning, it does take time to learn how to crochet. For me, it took 3-6 months (though I was procrastinating xD). So it may get incredibly frustrating. I mean, when I started, I was like, "It's not even possible to crochet!" But just keep trying and you'll get it!

A few other tips I have is don't overwork yourself! A lot of times whenever I do that I begin to feel super uninspired and demotivated, so I don't want to crochet anymore. Always take breaks, especially when you start to feel pain. Another tip I have is when you're first starting out, you should crochet a wide expanse of things. For example, crochet a plushy, then crochet a blanket, then crochet a top. By doing this, you can see what you mainly want to crochet and watch you don't want to crochet. So for me, I love crocheting plushies, but I don't like crocheting blankets very much.

Also, don't start off with giant projects or projects that use dark yarn or big, chunky yarn or fluffy yarn. Dark yarn makes it harder to see your stitches, chunky yarn can sometimes be harder to manage such it's so big, and you can't even see your stitches with fluffy yarn! And big projects might make crocheting feel overwhelming since they take so much time.

Another thing I recommend is learning all the stitches before you start following patterns. When I was first starting out, I followed a pattern that required me to make an increase. But at the time, I didn't know what an increase was and thought it was just a normal single crochet, so it ended up turning out wrong. The stitches you should at least learn before following patterns is: Single Crochet (sc), Double Crochet (dc), Half Double Crochet (hdc), Magic Circle/Magic Ring (mc/mr), and Bobble Stitch (bbl). Another I recommend learning soon after you learn is Triple/Tremple Crochet (tr).

Also, never compare yourself to other crocheters, especially ones who've been crocheting for longer than you. All it will do is bring you down and make you feel bad about yourself. Instead, if you are going to compare yourself to anyone, compare yourself to your current work to your old work to see how much you've improved!

I hope this helps! If you are trying to learn how to crochet or are a beginner crocheter, or even a crocheter who's been crocheting for a long time, keep practicing and expanding your knowledge on crochet!