Making my heart happy

I've been talking about this blanket on my podcast lately, (here and here if it's of interest) and how it's making my crochet heart happier than it's been in a long time.   It doesn't have to be granny squares, although the rhythmic simplicity of them does really hit the spot with me, but something about creating stacks of crocheted squares and seeing them pile up on one side, a basket full of colourful yarn balls sitting the other.  Oh how it just makes my little heart all warm and content.

As you'll know if you've seen the podcast, I'm calling this one the 'Sitting by the Fire' blanket.  Because that's the image I had in my head as I was thinking of the colours I wanted to use.  Warm colours that said 'curl up and snuggle right here, all cozy by this toasty fire and maybe with a little hot chocolate to drink too'.  A literal and metaphorical warm hug of a blanket is what I'm aiming for.

As much as I do chatter way on the podcast and show my progress, it can be hard to cover everything without making an epic feature of the thing and I've been getting a few questions about the yarn, the process I'm using, how I am placing the colours and so on, which I thought it might be useful to cover here.

Let's get into the detail...

(Summary at the end if you want to cut to the chase!)

Yarn & Hook

It would be impossible to pin down exact details here as I have such a vast and wide ranging amount of different yarns in this blanket.  Yarn from a multitude of different yarn dyers and vendors, collected up in whole skeins, minis and swaps from over many years.*  In fact I have raided my stash in a very literal sense and have scoured through it all to find the most suitably warm and snuggly colours that I could contribute to the cause.  I have a (possibly embarrassingly) large amount of 4ply/fingering weight yarn, more than I really have space for, so I am using that for the most part.  

Because I've had my fill of 4ply blankets for the time being and I didn't want to be making this blanket for the rest of my life, I am holding the yarn double (ie: 2 strands together) when crocheting.  Using it this way equates nicely to working with a DK weight and so I have also found a few balls of DK in the right colours and work and I have added those to the mix.

* Having said that, I am quite a conscientious Ravelry Stash user, so I've had a reasonable stab at noting many (but not all) that I am using here.

As using the yarn in this way is like using a DK weight yarn, I'm using the standard hook size for DK, 4mm, or a G hook if you are stateside.

Size & Yardage

I'm actually basing the idea of this blanket on one I made several years ago, which I still love, but wanted to re-make in warmer tones.  So I'm sticking to the three round granny squares of the original, but I want it to be a little larger.  My plan is for it to be 30 squares wide by 30 squares long and so I'm aiming for 900 squares.  A bit of a daunting task but I'm trying not to focus on that part!  My squares are coming out at about 7cm (2.5") so the final blanket should be somewhere in the region of 2m (82") square.

It's always hard to know how many yards you'll need to finish a huge blanket, especially when you don't know the final plan when you begin.  As I'm not sure on the border yet, I'll just think about the squares for now and worry about the rest later.  To begin, I made up about 60 squares, with all three rounds completed, and weighed those.  From that I worked out how many grams I was using per square and therefore roughly how many grams I'll need for 900 squares.  The answer is a lot!

 

Process

Now I've collected up all my colours I'm happily working on my crochet production line.  I've divided the amount of yarn I need loosely into two halves.  The first group of colours are the more saturated tones and they will make the first two rounds of my squares.  The second group are the paler, more neutrals tones and those will be used for the third (joining) round.

First I'm making a one round granny out of each of my more saturated tones.  I let them all pile up in a little basket until I've worked through every colour.  Once that's done, I sit and weave in all the ends.  The next step is to match all these little centres up with another saturated colour, this will be the second round colour.  I tip all my yarn out on the floor and then allocate a centre to each one.  I'm not being too precious about this, not thinking about the match up too much, just avoiding combos which I really don't like.

Once that's done, I collect them carefully all up and work on adding all the second rounds.  This is where make all the lovely little towers of squares that please me greatly.  Again, I leave the ends for now and just work them in when all the second rounds are added.

That's it for now.  Apart from the first 60 or so squares that I made and joined together at the beginning, where I worked all three rounds, I'll make up all the other squares I need to the two round stage, using up all my saturated colours, until I have the amount I need.  Then I'll work on the layout and joining.

Layout & Joining

The reason I'm working up just two round squares for now is so that I can distribute my colours in a way that I call 'organised random'.  It'll probably be a term familiar to you if you've been here a while, but it's my favourite way to distribute colours in a natural looking way.  I don't generally love following a specific system for a layout as it ends up in a more regimented scheme, or creates a distinct pattern, neither of which I would usually go for.  But I also don't want to go completely random and have no thought to where colours end up at all.  I wouldn't want similar colours too close to each other or to create eye jarring colour clashes.  I like to achieve a layout where the colours and patterns are not ordered but are still evenly distributed and look natural and pleasing.  Of course, it often takes quite a bit of time and effort to create this 'natural' look!  ;)

With this vast number of colours though, I don't think it will be too difficult to create a fairly random look and I'm planning on being quite loose with how I place the squares.  As I have do have a few stronger tone yarns I want to make sure their depth of colour is distributed nicely across the blanket though.  I also have varying quantities of  the different yarns and colours, so I want to make sure the yarns I have more of don't dominate and yarns I have less of are well spaced.  This will be much easier if I wait to the end.

Once I have all my two round grannies complete, I can work on the third round with the neutral tomes, joining as I go.  I have a mix of these paler colours too so I'll have to be careful to try and distribute these evenly as work on joining.  I'll also be throwing in a few squares that have a slightly darker third round, to keep things interesting.

Summery

Yarn | A mix of hand dyed and commercial yarns in 4ply/fingering weight held double.

Hook | 4mm (G)

Quantity | 900 granny squares in a 30 x 30 square shape

Size | 2m (82") square 

Pattern |  Three round granny squares, here's how I make mine:

My granny square pattern | How I change colours

Joining | Using Join As you Go - Photo tutorial

Well I think that's everything, but if you do have any questions, please do just ask below!

S x

♥

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