Colour Explosion


I have been having such colourful crochet fun lately.  Ever since I found the most fantastic Attic24, it's totally re-kindled my love of crochet and the very best thing about it is the complete heart swelling joy of playing with yarny colours.

I love every aspect of this part.  I love buying them, I love touching and comparing, holding the colours together, throwing in a random one to see how it looks.  I love to see all the lovely new colours lined up at home, filling a basket or bag, nestling up against one another and forming wonderful combinations by themselves.  I love selecting the colours to use together, trying endless permutations, thinking of new ones while I work.  I love crocheting them together, the final test to see if they'll work in harmony.  I love seeing the pattern emerge in glorious technicolour and, you know what, I don't even really mind too much, sewing all the ends in.  If only because, then you get to see the final article, unsullied by messy, pokey out bits.   Ahh.... (contented) sigh....

Which brings me to the point of this post because, this is exactly what I have been spending much of my time doing, in the pursuit of a mind boggling, colour explosion of a Granny Stripe Blanket.  Although, possibility even better then I mentioned above, because I have also been busting some major stash while I'm at it.

For some time now, I've had a mounting collection of Hayfield Bonus DK from previous projects and blankets.  It's an excellent acrylic yarn for blankets and brilliant value for money but I find it to be quite thick for a DK yarn, so I'm finding it hard to use up by mixing in the colours in with other DK yarns that I have.  As I had so much of it, I needed a good use for it and this seemed the perfect answer.  I had a couple of rather dubious colours in there, internet gambles that didn't pay off, but with careful arrangement and a very small amount (2 balls) of purchased yarn, I hoped to get away with it.

I've only given you a sneaky peak up above, so I think it's time to show you my latest love and my new favourite evening cuddle...



Isn't it a riot of colour?  I do adore it, it makes me very happy to look at.  Here, lets have a closer look...








It's quite hard to get a full sized picture of it.  I think it's definitely the largest blanket I've ever made so far.  But here it all is stretched out on the bed...



And sort of water-falling off of it...





I haven't actually measured it yet, but that's a king sized bed it's sat on and as you can see, it falls over the sides to so I'm guessing at about 7x5 feet.

And because I'm slightly strange and enjoy such information here's some other stats for you:

I used a total of 4130 yards of yarn, 3557 for the blanket and 573 for the border.
I used a total of 18 different colours, 16 of Hayfield Bonus DK and 2 Stylecraft Special DK.
I made a starting chain of 240+3 (for the turning chain) which made 80 shells across each row.
I did two rows of colour for each stripe and there are a total of 66 stripes.
I used a average of 54 yards per stripe.
I did 7 rows for the border.

Well, I hope you like it as much as I do, I'm off to cuddle it and work on the next colourful project....

S x