The growing up blanket

Shortly after my daughter Aria was born I had the urge to make her another blanket. We chose not to find out the sex while I was pregnant, and I wouldn't change that amazing feeling when she was born for the world, but it did of course mean that the blankets I had made for her arrival were gender neutral. I wanted to make a girly blanket.
She already had plenty of car seat, pram and cot sized blankets so I started to think towards something bigger, and the idea for the Growing Up Blanket was formed. I wanted to make something suitable for covering her bed as she grew up. Something she could lay on the sofa with to watch films or when she is poorly. Something she would take to university and her friends will ask where she got her beautiful vintage afghan from (warm and fuzzy feeling building again!)

I knew immediately that I wanted to make sunburst granny squares as they just scream girly, pretty floral thoughts to me, so the next big decision was colours. This was actually really easy as I just picked my favourite pinks and purples out. I went with Candyfloss, Fondant, Clematis, Raspberry, Magenta, Plum, Wisteria and Violet. I decided to edge with cream to allow the colours to shine.

I had no idea at the beginning just how long this was going to take me and just how much yarn it would use. I started shortly after Aria's birth and it was complete when she was 4 months old.

I ordered 3 balls of the cream for the joining and used 7 in total! I was quite inexperienced at this point and have gone up a very steep learning curve since. Each square is made of 4 rounds and I tried to make every single one different. When I was joining them together I discovered I had one duplicate and this irritated me somewhat, but not enough to redo it.

For the border I decided upon the block stitch as I felt it gave a nice finish with distracting from the main pattern. If you stare at it for too long it starts to play tricks with your eyes.

As mentioned in previous posts my choice of yarn is Stylecraft Special DK. Every week the Stylecraft Facebook page hold a spotlight called Clevercrafters#, where they invite people to send in pictures and details of their makes and they choose 5 of those projects to feature on their page.
Shortly after completing this blanket I sent them some photos and a brief story about it and it was the first project they showcased that week! I was beaming with pride as so many talented people send things in each week, they sometimes have hundreds of entries. For them to pick my work was such a confidence booster.

At the time of writing this Aria is 9 months old and has been using her blanket every day. She takes her naps under it and it sits folded at the end of her cot when not in use. It has been subjected to the usual baby bodily fluids and has washed well!

I do of course have two children, and as any parent will know- you cant give to one and not the other right? My Son Blake has a blanket on my hook right now, and I'm hoping to have it completed in time for next weeks post.

Take care and thanks for reading

Berni x