If you read back to one of my first posts, I discussed wanting to rip out my Cozy Memories blanket. I just wasn’t a huge fan of it and knowing that the squares might not all align well was driving me crazy. I decided I wanted to crochet a blanket instead, thinking it would go faster. I decided to do the Granny Stripes blanket because I didn’t have to worry about how much yarn I had for each color. I wouldn’t mind swapping in the middle of the row.
I was hanging out with my husband and his mom over the holidays and thinking about how I wanted to do this. When I start the Cozy Memories blanket, I bought a lot of black yarn so that I could outline each square. I liked the separated look better than all of the colors together. Translating that into the striped blanket, I considered striping the black in between the colors, but in the end felt that if I didn’t have enough yarn to finish a color row, I’d get as annoyed as I was at the last scrap blanket. Another option I have is that I can do a black border around the blanket if I want when it is done. I also have the option of not using the black at all and finding another purpose for it, which is also fine.
Right before I started the Granny Stripes blanket, I browsed a bit more on Ravelry and saw the Ripple blanket. My husband liked it immediately and so I cast it on right then and there. I’m not using any black in it for now and will decide if I want a border on it later. I actually started off with a sample so that I didn’t have to cast on so many stitches and then decide the pattern was too hard. It went fairly easily (the instructions are soooo good) and so I cast on a foundation chain of 199 (196 + 3) and crossed my fingers that I had the right amount. I figured if I didn’t then I could increase or decrease and no one would notice that in the first row. It actually worked perfectly, which was very nice.
I’ve decided that for now, I’m just going to use the same color for 2 rows (there and back) and then move on even if I have enough yarn left to keep going. For a lot of these leftovers, I have about 1/2 skein left and I don’t necessarily want to use that much of each color. I figure I can always reuse the same color later on if I want to. What I’m thinking of doing is that after I crochet the two rows, I’ll find another project for the leftovers and make some charity items with it.
