Hap-py blanket

A dear friend recently lost her father quite suddenly. I pondered what to do for her until I remembered this bag of Louet Riverstone that had been sitting in my stash for quite a while. Why had I bought it? The color isn't me at all. Well, clearly I bought it for this friend. Now, what do to with it? 

I started to look at shawl and blanket patterns  when I realized that I could adapt my Hap-py shawl (phone blogging - you can find a link to the pattern on my patterns page) into a comfort blanket that would be perfect: some garter stitch simplicity + eyelet rows for excitement. I would increase until the first skein ran out (center square is worked diagonally), then use another skein to complete the center. After that I would keep track of how many lace repeats I got out of the next two skeins to get an idea of how far I could go with the last one. Funnily enough I did the same number of lace edging rows as the original shawl. 

Working on the center in the sunshine

Finished egg carton lace

Blocking glory

Ready for giving (I'm wearing it folded in half since I couldn't figure out how to take a selfie of me wrapped up in the blanket :)

The finished blanket took about 4.5 skeins (900 yds) of worsted wool, and I was able to start the lace edging with seven repeats on each side. It was such a pleasurable knit that I may need to make one to keep (two colors, perhaps?). 

This was a fairly quick, cosy, comforting knit, and I hope it will provide some comfort for my friends loss. 

Now that I'm finished with this I'm hard at work pattern writing, grading, and reviewing tech edits with nary a stitch to knit. Hopefully I can clear all the work and number stuff off my plate and get clicking tomorrow...

What are you working on the moment?

Thanks for stopping by, and happy knitting!

xoxo, Kathleen