I made a few
fish hats for my hairdresser's grandkids a while back and of course she hears about my latest projects every three months or so when I visit. So during one visit she mentioned having a baby shower to attend and asked if I could make a baby blanket for her to give as a gift in exchange for doing my hair in the future. Sounded cool and I took the job.
It happened that I was visiting Houston shortly after and I decided to swing through
Twisted Yarns on the way home. They have such a good range of Cascade products and I love to use it whenever I want something a little nicer. This blanket we wanted to be more a long term use blanket and not strictly a
baby blanket. They had a ton of colors in Cascade 220 Superwash Sport, which is a little thinner than the yarn called for in the pattern, but I think it will make a nicer finished product. Bonus: it is machine wash and dry!
Speaking of patterns, I am going to use the
Chevron Baby Blanket by Rachel C. which is free on Ravelry. I really like the overall shape it makes while being kind of modern looking. This way the new daughter in question can use it for a long time.
Colors asked for were pink, purple, and black. I feel like that can be kind of a harsh color set so I tried to pick colors that were a little softer and that would age well. I wanted to stay far away from that zebra and leopard print color schemes you see sometimes for girls... stuff like that is the worst.
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| Colors (L to R): Black, Royal Purple, Pale Lavender, Strawberry Cream, Raspberry |
I needed eight skeins, but had 5 colors picked out so I got one of each and two of the main three colors. This means I need to plan out my striping, but I was going to anyway, so no biggie. I tried quite a few different patterns out of small thin stripes alternating orders, but it looked a mess on my screen and hurt my eyes. Eye hurt is not what we are going for. So instead I opted for a large color block chevron pattern.
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| Pardon my wonky chevrons and colors, but you get the idea. |
Once I had the order down, I set to work. They way I have it laid out, also works perfectly with the skeins I bought. One full skein of black, then both royal purple, then the full lavender, the full strawberry cream, both raspberry, and the other skein of black.
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| First skein of black and two pink complete. |
The pattern itself is astonishingly simple. It is a single row that is worked over and over. Once you've got it down, no reference to the pattern is needed, which is really freeing. I cannot get over those lovely straight vertical edges. As any crochet person might know, double crochet rows often have an odd hole at the end and slightly offset edges. This pattern has
a little trick from MamaChee at the ends to get really crisp edges at the end of each row.
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| Great mobile project. Looks crisp and modern I think. |
Each of my skeins made about 10 rows of color. From there I could estimate how large this would be. Finished size is 27" x 39", which I feel is a little on the small size, but it is really stretchy. I could have probably blocked this out larger.
I like the light and portable nature of this blanket. It is a perfect lap, car, or throw blanket for an adult, so I have to think it will be perfect for a baby/toddler for a while. Fingers crossed that they like it.
Difficulty: Easy
Time to complete: 25 hours
