The next blanket

The next blanket, #209, combines two of my less favourite colours, bright red and yellow.  The yellow, in a regular stripe, came from two boucle yarns, the first an unlabelled wool, tightly spun and very bright.  The second was a ball of Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Astrakhan, quite pleasant with the microfibre and cashmere blended with wool.

If you look at the blanket from a distance it looks quite cheerful.  I was pleased to use up the yarns.  Boucle is awkward knitting, but it does add a lot of texture.

For this blanket I unravelled this cardigan.  It is a Kaffe Fassett pattern, Wentworth, from Rowan 46.  The pattern is completed in numerous shades of Rowan Kidsilk Haze.  The knitter here included several shades of a non-mohair yarn, I think it is Rowan Felted Tweed.  It adds stability to the garment.  In the blanket the short lengths of Kidsilk Haze add a surprising amount of softness, in addition to the Debbie Bliss Angel mohair that I also included.

Sock yarn blanket 5

This is the next bus knitting, another blanket using sock yarn.  I bought the yarn, Regia 4 fädig Multieffekt Color in a pack of 10 balls, half price in a sale with the intention of knitting a sweater for myself.  When I came to use the yarn, some eight years later, I really did not want to wear light blue, so it became this blanket instead.  I knitted the yarn doubled with Jaeger Matchmaker 4 ply pure wool from a charity shop, in a deeper shade of blue.

This was satisfying bus knitting in my usual bias garter stitch blocks for over a year.  I stopped knitting when I ran out of the sock yarn.  I did three more blocks using a grey yarn to get a rectangular shaped blanket.  Then it took me another six months to get round to joining the blocks and doing the edging.  I did it by crochet.  I am not pleased with this way of doing it because it looks crude.  Next time I might do it by knitting instead, even if it takes longer.

The blanket feels heavy, but it will no doubt be warm and practical.  It will be machine washable too.  I like the way the striping forms crosses at the corners.

Sock yarn blanket 5

Yarn: Regia 4 fädig Multieffekt Color and Jaeger Matchmaker 4 ply pure wool
Needles: 4.5 mm
Size: 100 cm by 140 cm

Weight: 1120 gr

Done 21 January 2018 to 23 September 2019

The next blanket

The next blanket, #208, is the next dark ones.  They are all the same now.  I use the same black wool, and there is a lot of green to go through.  This one has navy mohair, navy cotton and brown and dark grey wool.  It is much darker than the pictures.  The white bits belong to a nice black white marled alpaca, unlabelled.

To add to the green I unravelled a neat light short green cardigan.  The yarn turned out to be lovely.  It is a flecked thin tweed yarn, a pleasure to knit with.

Rau sweater

The next yarn to be used was Rowan Lenpur Linen, bought in sales some eight years ago.  I had 10 balls each in two shades, Cocoa - brown and Tattoo - grey.  The pattern that I found was in Knitscene Summer 2017, Rau sweater by Quenna Lee.

It is a simple design, stocking stitch body and sleeves with a garter stitch yoke with lace detail on the front.  I knitted the body and the sleeves in the round.  The front and back yokes are joined at the shoulders with three needle cast off.  I didn't do very well doing it in garter stitch - a good thing it doesn't show in the pictures.  The stitches for the sleeves are picked up and worked downwards.  I did full length sleeves, having cold wrists.

It was straightforward knitting.  The lace detail was an interesting and something different for me.  I managed to get the number of stitches right so it fits me well.  Mine has more ease than the pattern, deliberately.  I did the yoke in grey - and the rest in brown - because I thought there might not be enough brown.  There would have been.  I like wearing it.

The yarn, viscose 75% and linen 25%, feels nice to the touch when knitted.  But, it splits badly, so I had to be careful knitting it.  I would avoid similar yarns in future.

Rau Sweater, Quenna Lee (Knitscene Summer 2017)

Yarn: Rowan Lenpur Linen, viscose 75% linen 25%, Cocoa and Tattoo shades

Needles: 3.0mm for rib and yoke, 3.5mm for body and sleeves

Size: S

Weight: 460gr

Knitted 29 April to 18 August 2019

The next blanket

The next blanket, #207, turned out quite pleasing.  I managed to omit all discordant shades, and all blend together nicely.  The blanket is white and pink with grey and beige shades.  My only thought was that I must include more whites in the next one.

I unravelled this cardigan, from one of Kaffe Fassett's early kits.  This must be the third or fourth I have done.  It contains mainly Rowan DK wools in nice shades.  It was knitted in fairisle and was easy to unravel.

According to my spreadsheet the next lots to be added are other 1990s Rowan yarns.  One is an Annabel Fox beige DK, a total of 9.5 balls so it will last a long time.  The mohair next to it is not Rowan; it is Jonelle but nice nonetheless.

The unlabelled balls in this picture are Rowan, a 4 ply tweed often used in their kits.  It could be Light Tweed or Fine Fleck Tweed, or something else altogether.  I often find yarn from Rowan 1990s kits and I can't help buying it, thinking I must give it a good home.  My blankets seem an appropriate place.  It is lovely yarn to knit with and it adds nice texture.

CKCA7 Greenway

This is my next blanket from Comfort Knitting and Crochet Afghans, a crochet design, Greenway, by Donna Yacino.  I skipped #6 Ribbon because broomstick lace does not interest me.

Greenway on the other hand was tempting.  I had the cotton yarn in mind, and I like this kind of crochet pattern with rows in different colours.  The yarn was Patons 4 ply mercerized cotton in shades of white, cream and beige (plus one ball of similar Sirdar).  To add I had one ball of lavender and some unlabelled matt cotton in bright apricot and pink/brown.  I devised a regular striping pattern - it may be difficult to spot but it is there.

Since my yarn is thinner than the yarn in the pattern I worked out the number of stitches needed for a regular blanket, and I got it nearly right.  The pattern was clear and it was easy enough to do.  But it took such a long time with thin yarn.  I enjoy crochet but the problem with a slow project is that I am anxious to finish it because I would rather be knitting.

I decided the blanket was done when I ran out of yarn.  It was far too short for a standard blanket, but that couldn't be helped.  I did the edging, in an unlabelled cream cotton, as the pattern; one round of double crochet followed by one round of crab stitch.  It works.  I knotted the ends two by two on the side and crocheted over them when I did the edging, no other fastening.

I don't like the blanket very much.  The cotton makes it stiff compared to a woollen blanket, and not at all comfortable to snuggle under.  The best use would be as a picnic rug or play blanket for children.  It would be hard wearing and easily washable being cotton.

I do like the stripes and the colours, and I could look at it for a long time.  The apricot lifts it, and not even the lavender disturbs me.



This is where I decided to abandon my project to work my way consecutively through the projects in this book.  Now that my objective is to finish the yarn in the yarn store chronologically doing challenging patterns takes too long.  I need patterns that I can do while watching TV, and since I get most pleasure from putting yarns and colours together the patterns can be straightforward.

But glancing through the book now I keep seeing patterns that I would like to try...

I also need to decide what to do about the thin cotton yarns in the yarn store.  I had saved them for this kind of crochet, but however simple the pattern it takes too long.  I could use them doubled but that doesn't appeal to me.  Now I'm considering using them in my standard blankets.  It would add nice texture.

Greenway

Pattern: Comfort Knitting and Crochet Afghans Donna Yacino
Yarn: Patons 4 ply cotton and others
Hook: 2.5 mm
Size: 115 cm by 130 cm

Weight: 1150 gr

Done 17 March to 31 August 2019

The next blanket

The next blanket, #206, turned out to be rather nice.  It has darkish colours, red with brown, green and grey.  In reality the blanked is darker than the pictures.  It is the regular stripe of Rowan Magpie aran that makes it.  I would call the shade rust, but I found that it is called ginger.  The royal blue mohair doesn't look out of place either.  I have a lot of mohair in this shade, and I don't like it much.  Perhaps it will be possible to find a good place for it after all.

The yarn that stands out a bit, but not too much, is from an unravelled John Lewis sweater, in lilac Johnston chunky cashmere.  It adds softness.  I was afraid that the yarn would be too thick, but it works.  The sweater is knitted in an interesting cable pattern with a circular yoke, but not in the round.  I bought it cheaply in a charity shop, it fitted well and I wore it for several years.

The next blanket

The next blanket, #205, is blue with some pink and the usual grey and beige.  I like these colours.  I added some thicker yarns and an odd rough blue mohair that gave the blanket a lot of texture.

I unravelled this cabled poloneck sweater in a lilac tweed yarn.  The yarn is nice, and the sweater shows no signs of having been worn.  It is my size, and I have tried it on.  I couldn't wear it because the wide sleeves make it uncomfortable.  It was easy to unravel.

Then I added this Lopi Gefjun Tweed yarn.  A pleasure to knit with.

The next blanket

The next blanket, #204, is another with white.  I like the yarns in this one, some nice blues and greens among the white, grey and beige.  There is thin green mohair yarn to give softness, but you can't see it.





For this blanket I unravelled this Spirit of the Andes alpaca tunic.  The yarn is nice, thin, soft, presumably undyed.  The body and sleeves are knitted in the round, with the raglan sleeves sewn in.  Unravelling the patterned cable stitch is more interesting than plain stocking stitch.

Without thinking I put the yarn in the washing machine on a normal wash, and this is how it came out.  It was not very difficult to get hold of an end and pull it away for winding into a ball.  And since it was alpaca it didn't break easily.  It made the yarn nicely fluffy.  This was just the first two hanks.  I will wash the rest in a more considerate way.

The next blanket

The next blanket, #203, is another dark one, in black, navy, brown, grey.  After my decision to stop buying yarn I decided to use yarn store yarns for my standard blankets.  There is no need to hoard them anymore; now the objective is to use everything.

I go through my spreadsheet chronologically, and add multiples of balls of yarn to the blankets.  I have another pile of odd balls to supplement, and now I include aran weight and anything that doesn't seem too thick.  This time I added hanks of Rowan aran Magpie, in this case dark navy, 25 gr hanks of Rowan DK and black Rowan 4 ply botany wool.  These have all been in the yarn store for many years, and it feels good to see them disappear.

The garment I unravelled is a navy cotton Cos cardigan.  It is huge and heavy, nearly 1 kg in weight.  It is my size but far too large and heavy to wear.  It looks reasonable in the picture.  I like the yarn, a smooth cotton that is easy to knit.

Afghan in a minute C40

The yarn was the reason for this blanket C40, a second version of Afghan in a minute from The best from Annie's Attic.  This was my first version.  It followed my decision to knit all my yarns as blankets and in simple patterns.  In fact, since it was aran weight the yarn should have gone into my standard blankets, but it was good quality, and I had wondered about what to do with it for years, so this is what it became.

The yarn was Jaeger Matchmaker Merino Aran, pure wool.  I had 10 balls in dark grey, shade Granite, and 7 balls in Light natural.  With this I looked for a brighter yarn, and found Cascade 220 Superwash in three shades of pink/lavender.  For more interest in knitting I added Regia Handdye Effect sock yarn.

I did my usual one row three yarn stripe.  I had planned to do a kind of gradient effect pattern by using up all of one ball of the pink before starting the next and the same with the sock yarn.  It didn't work, because I realised too late that somebody had written 85 gr on one of the Regia balls, which meant that I switched both pink and sock yarn at the same time with a sharp contrast.  Right in the middle of the blanket.  I realised too late what had happened.

I enjoyed the knitting with nice yarns.  Very easy.  I didn't do a border this time, because I liked the look of the tension square without borders.  Because of the sock yarn, there was enough yarn for a full length single blanket.  I cast off when I had run out of yarn.  The blanket is warm and cosy, as long as you don't look at it too long.

I didn't like the Regia yarn much.  The colours are fine, but it consists of wool surrounded by a thin nylon, I think, thread.  It is a nuisance, because it splits easily, and once the nylon has separated it get entangled with other yarn.  I don't know what it would be like on its own. 

Afghan in a minute, The best from Annie's Attic C40

Yarns: Jaeger Matchmaker Merino Aran, 100 % wool, Granite and Light Natural

            Cascade 220 Superwash Shades 834, 837, 807

            Regia Handdye Effect sock yarn Shades 06553, 06557, 06550

Needles: 5.5 mm
Size: 120 cm by 170 cm, 1560 gr
Knitted 23 December 2018 to 16 March 2019