I can’t even begin to describe how excited I am to write about this blanket. Not only was there a lot of love involved in the creation of this blanket, but it was so much fun to make. It stitched up beautifully, and quickly, and looks like charming little cupcakes. The stitch itself was also incredibly easy, and very easy to passively work on while watching TV, or if I was stuck on what felt like an endless hold for work. Admittedly, I worked on this during more than one Zoom Jackbox game night as well!
This blanket is the Crochet Modern Granny Blanket from Daisy Farm Crafts. It’s available in her blog post, but also available as an ad-free PDF from her Etsy shop here. She’s also got an accompanying video in her blog to explain carrying and changing the colours over (which I also have a small trick for as well!). Realistically, you’re best checking out her blog and Etsy shop anyways to really get an idea of just how beautiful the blanket is, because I’m still a terrible photographer, and cannot do her blanket justice.
Back last fall, I reconnected with an old friend from university. Her and I were inseparable years ago, basically sisters. It’s a long, sad story, but we did have a falling out right before graduation, and spent nearly a decade out of each other’s lives because of it. We thankfully were able to reconcile what happened over some great food and kombucha (as we were both trying to conceive at the time), and now, our friendship is almost as if we haven’t been away from each other.
When I began looking for a pattern for her, it couldn’t just be any old pattern. I needed something delicate, and beautiful, and equally as charming for her little one. I probably spent days looking for something, scrolling endlessly through Google, Pinterest, Etsy, Ravely, you name it. When I found the Modern Granny Blanket, I knew it was the one.
As always, came the hard part – picking colours. I have a terrible sense of colours and palettes, and can’t seem to coordinate colours properly. I tend to colour block to stay safe, and my wardrobe is basically black on varying shades of black. I was very grateful that the love of my life stepped in on this one. He knew the pattern I had in mind, and I set him loose in the yarn aisle of Michael’s. He settled on Caron Simply Soft, in White, Off-White and Soft Pink, and I didn’t argue with him. The colours looked beautiful together, and I had faith they would be as perfect as I needed them to be.
One of the hurdles for this blanket, is definitely the colour carrying. You’re only doing two rows before switching colours, so it’s easy to carry the yard up the sides together, and it’s not really enough rows to want to cut it off and add it back on as you go – it would just be too many ends to weave in. I’ve attempted drop stitch crochet, and never seem to be able to make it to end the of a pattern out of frustration with dragging the balls of yarn around. I’m not really known for sitting in one place very really with a project, it follows me around the house, so having a way to keep three balls of yarn together was important for me. So I came up with this;
It doesn’t look like much, but keep the yarn in a shoe box was absolutely perfect. It kept the yarn together nicely, in the order of the colours I was going row by row with, and as long as I paid attention, the lines stayed tangle free. I was then able to work on this blanket all throughout the house, rather than being stuck in one place while working on it. I’m not sure how well a shoe box would work for larger drop stitch projects, or tapestry projects, but it’s definitely something I would consider trying again in the future to make it a little easier.
If you make this blanket to the standard measurements of a baby blanket, and you use the same yarn I did, three skeins of Caron Simply Soft will make this blanket and the suggested border from the blog post. I’m not super great at making baby blankets the size they’re supposed to be, I’m always making them a little bit bigger than they’re supposed to be, so I found myself playing chicken near the end with my off-white as the border. Thankfully, just before everything closed down in my area for our lock down, I made an incredibly last minute trip to Michael’s to pick up extra yarn, because I knew this was going to be an issue. I ended up WAY over-buying, because I didn’t know when I’d see the inside of a craft store again, and could probably make this blanket again three or four times – but that’s neither here or there. Now I’ve got some pretty colours in my stash!
I’m still impressively terrible at taking photos of my work, and I didn’t take too many photos of this blanket – mostly because I know I’ll be seeing a lot of it as it gets used. This for sure is a blanket I’m very happy about though. It turned out so pretty, and will be absolutely perfect for the little it’s been gifted to, though, maybe not so perfect until the fall!
Until next!
tanksinheels.com 