Crochet Blanket

Moving house recently has been a little bit of an adventure, and a huge throw into the adult world for me. I've finally moved out of my parents house and into my own place, which has sparked a need in me to finish off the projects I've got and start making more from stash then I might have done otherwise. With starting at a new knit group, my mind was drawn to a blanket I was making with my old knit group to give to a local hospice. So it only felt right to give finishing this one a go.

My old knit group took in donations of yarn to make blankets to give to the local hospice and old people's home. Many people took the yarn and knitted squares, they then pooled their efforts into one big blanket. I however fancied a bit of crochet at the time, so started making granny squares. I would make a few then go and collect another set of colours to create a scrappy style blanket, which I enjoyed. The donated yarn was mainly double knit, of all different shades and colours. I used a 3.5mm hook and made squares that were more or less 6". A couple of the squares were significantly larger, mainly due to the yarn being more aran weight then DK. Seeing as most of the yarn was donated as used balls, it was par for the course.

Once I had got my squares out after moving, I laid them out to see how many I had and what I needed. For a small lap blanket I needed two more squares. Which I managed fairly easily, they took a couple of days of a little crochet after work. Most of the previous squares had been made at my knit night. Once I had them I could think about how they were to go together. Which was a fun process of laying all the squares out on the floor to see how they would best go together. It really is my favourite part of blanket making!

After deciding the lay out, I then had to figure out how to join them together. I decided that I would try and crochet them together - because who can stand sewing up... - so I had a rummage in my stash for something to join them with. I had a large amount of cream yarn, mostly unlabelled given me by my grandmother, which did just the trick. It made me feel pretty good about using more yarn from my stash. I think the cream was a little on the thicker side as well, more aran then DK, so was a little stiff to work with and did create a thicker gauge, but it held together quite well. I ended up picking up one stitch on each of the squares and then crocheting them together as if it was a crochet decrease. I feel that it worked well, and created a lovely ridge between the squares. It wasn't a planned effect, but I'm pretty pleased nonetheless.

I finished off the blanket with a double crochet border, which I thought brought the whole thing together. Weaving in the ends did not take that long, and within a few nights the blanket was done, and I am very pleased. It's one less WIP in the pile and one less project in my house. It will be making its way to my old knit group, to then be given away to the hospice lined up for it. It is far from perfect but I really hope it brings a little bit of warmth and happiness to its new owner.