Answering an open question from 2007, we construct infinite k-crossing-critical families of graphs which contain vertices of any prescribed odd degree, for sufficiently large k. From this we derive that, for any set of integers D such that min(D)>=3 and 3,4eD, and for all sufficiently large k there exists a k-crossing-critical family such that the numbers in D are precisely the vertex degrees which occur arbitrarily often in any large enough graph in this family. We also investigate what are the possible average degrees of such crossing-critical families.