When blankets go bad?

November 22, 2013

When blankets go bad?

I think it might be reasonable to assume that an awful lot of you reading out there are pretty interested in colour. Working with colours, seeing and enjoying pretty combinations and hoping to find new ones?

I wonder if you also think you'll always be learning about how to use colour? I know I do.

Take these squares for example. They are supposed to be for my fabulous new blanket idea. As is often the case, I found some lovely inspiration from the world of web. On this occasion, the images that caught my eye and got me pretty excited were this one, this one in the background and most especially, this too. Nice, no?

I loved the subtle elegance of Little Cotton Rabbit's Misty Afghan, but subtle elegance isn't really one of my strong areas. So I was aiming for something a bit more colourful, but I liked the cohesive feel that the pale rows and then blue border brought to the blanket, so I wanted to play with that idea for mine too.

I've been hoarding Cascade 220 for a while now, so I have quite a good stock built up to choose from. I wanted to try out some more unusual colour combinations and after making a few squares the results were a little hit and miss. Well, no matter, any blanket can lose a few 'uglies' so I kept going...

Ten squares down and I'm still not sure. There's a few I love, there's a few I like, a few that I can tolerate and a few that are just plain ugly. The bigger problem came from laying the squares out to try and get a feel for overall look that I was going to get.

Humm, now I do have a problem, I don't like it.

Actually, in these photos I must admit, they really don't look too bad. They look quite bright and colourful, but the in flesh... not so good. They look quite dowdy and murky in person and the effect of them all together is just a little too dull and dreary for my liking. Not subtle and not cohesive at all, just a bit dour.

So my blanket idea has stalled.

I ordered a few more colours, but that didn't really seem to help too much. Maybe I have too many colours and should go back and trim my palette. I could abandon my original idea of blue and greeny shade last rows or I could try and lose some of the more dowdy colours. I could just carry on and hope for the best. I could just stick it all in a cupboard and come back to them later. I could even rip them all and start again, with more squares or even a brand new idea.

I spoke to a kind and wonderful crafty friend about it just the other day. It's always nice to be able to have a chat about these things and she helped me see that the blanket perhaps isn't a lost cause. I'd made a few squares with brighter last rows and we mixed them in. That helped a lot but doesn't fit in with my original idea. But maybe my original idea just isn't working out.