Nice little pattern! I love when the bootie patterns don’t require me to sew parts together- A++ on that aspect!

I used an h for the base of the bootie then switched to a g for the crocodile stitch part.
round 9 is when I changed it up.

I gave myself a foundation for the crocodile stitch by:

a9. ch 2 (counts as dc), dc in same stitch, ch 2, skip one stitch, 2dc in next stitch, ch 2, skip one stitch; repeat from around; join
a10. Ch 2, turn, 5dc around 1st dc, ch 1, 5dc around second dc, sl in next 2dc group, repeat from around; join
I repeated a9-a10 twice more then sc around to give a nice edge.