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Showing posts with label Cinco de Mayo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cinco de Mayo. Show all posts

Friday, September 16, 2011

Cinco de Mayo, Mardi Gras Baby Blankets for Charity

Finished Object Friday post (link in sidebar)

oddball baby blanketsCinco de Mayo on the left, and Mardi Gras on the right. These are Oddball Baby Blankets. I've blogged about them as a wipw post, and on the yop post. Here they are done. Actually there's still pinned here as they were being blocked. I'm pleased to say the heavy duty blocking did take care of evening out the sides. If you want to see the before and after Click here. My portion on both these blankets was Border Patrol.

Had hoped to have another Cotton Cloth done for the Cotton Cloth Calendar Challenge to show you today; but have been rather busy dealing with an elderly aunt and getting her admitted to a nursing home. My last couple of days off have been short of knitting time.

The weather is turning here in Central Ohio. I'm actually sitting here inside drinking hot coffee, have a fleece on even. It's only 43 degrees this am, which is only 11 degrees above freezing! That causes me to think about switching gears on my projects, as items for the homeless are so needed when the weather turns. Bridge and Beyond will get my knitting and crocheting attention.

Wednesday, September 07, 2011

Challenges with OddBall Blankets

WIPW (links in sidebar)
Oddball Blankets is a group on line on Ravelry. Each person knits their section based on a theme. Rules say no ribbing or cable stitches should be used as they draw in and make things uneven, count your stitches before and after your section to be sure you have 100, adjust the number of garter stitches for the edge to prevent curling, use the same type of yarn (sport, baby, knitted worsted etc.) mail onto the next person on the needles after knitting your 4 inches. The above theme is Mardi Gras. My spot is called border patrol. Crochet a border on this knitted blanket......pull it together and finish it off, mail it onto the organizer to be donated to local hospitals. Stitches selected should be reversible and have no right or wrong side. I've found over time, there's lots of leeway with the stitch selection, the yarn selection and sometimes it's quite a challenge to finish them off doing the border patrol. The yellow and purple sections do pull in, quite a bit. Hoping when I add border stitches that unevenness is less noticeable, and or when laundered and blocked it will be even.

I select 2 bright colors and do several rows of border. It does, I think pull it together...color and theme wise; but it doesn't even it up as much as I had hoped. The yellow section though not cables or ribbing definitely pulls the blanket inward. It's a lovely stitch too, so it's a shame. Click to enlarge, I don't know what the stitch is. Probably not a good choice for a group project, but would make an awesome scarf, and or blanket on it's own.

Close up of the border, and the pretty yellow section. Fingers crossed when blocked I can even it up more.
WOW, this one Cinco de Mayo really has issues with being very uneven. The black in the center is infact ribbing. I love this blanket, I love it's bright colors and variety of stitches; but am concern about the challenge of evening this one out.
It's a beginning. Yarn selected and stitches to use for the border patrol pattern have also been selected as this point. But, as you can see after one round of single crochets how far off it still is.
A close up shows a good 3 1/2 inches variance is the width of this blanket. I don't know if even heavy duty blocking will get the job done here. Pondering my choice of stitches again on this. As I continue to work on it, am constantly pulling, stretching it...in hopes of improving the rather large gap.