Of Blocks and Blocking

Greetings and Dear Laura:

Those are really cute baby booties! I really liked the ones that Knitting at Lunch made with that pattern, but I'm anxious to see how you eliminate that seam. I'm always in favor of that.

I did some finishing and blocking over the weekend. Saturday, I blocked a baby blanket that my SIL Chris made. This is such a cool blanket! She did a Feather and Fan pattern, using Schoeller & Stahl "BIG BALL" yarn. We saw a similar blanket at Sarah Jane's Yarn Shoppe, and she couldn't resist making one for her granddaughter.

I helped her find the pattern and get started on this, and since we knew from the sample that two balls would not make a very large blanket, I advised her to make it a bit narrower so she could get length, and then we'd block it out wider. (The sample was wider than it was long, and that always looks like poor planning to me!) What I didn't account for is the fact that this yarn is not wool (100% Polyacrylic) and so when I unpinned it, it lost most of the shape I had blocked in. It's a good size tho, and I think it's really pretty!

I was playing around with some 'shades of red' Cascade 220 on Sunday, trying to figure out another square for the blanket for Jess's grandpa. I settled on a stitch pattern from my Harmony Guide, and I like how it came out. I worked on it while watching baseball, and before I knew it, it was complete!



I filled the sink with water to block the square and while I was at it decided to block the first Lizard Ridge Square that I had laying around. I stretched it out to be flat and came up with a 10 x 11 block, which will give me a finished blanket of 60 x 44. THEN I looked at the directions and discovered I should have steam blocked it to almost flat. Oh well! Guess we're going with regular blocking on this one!



So, two blocks and a blanket blocked!

Keep knitting!

Cynthia (aka Designated Knitter!)