Waylon's blanket

Earlier this year, we learned that my sister-in-law Linda's daughter Brianna was expecting her first child, which was going to be Linda's very first grandchild, and our family was super excited to welcome our newest little addition. It's going to be a boy! 💙

Naturally, this news also meant that Auntie Susan needed to get busy stitching up a keepsake blanket to welcome her newest grandnephew!

Finished with 43 rows, before blocking

I searched for baby blanket ideas for a few days with nothing really jumping out and grabbing me until Red Heart Yarns shared on social media their pattern for this blanket made with Red Heart Bitty Stripes yarn. Instantly I could see in my mind's eye how amazing this design would look made in shades of blue and green, so I ordered the kit with those colors and then anxiously waited for it to arrive. 

This pattern says to use an 11.5 mm hook, even though the yarn is rated as a standard 4 weight. I did purchase the 11.5 mm hook with the Yarnspirations kit (it was less than $2, and I didn't already own a hook that size, so why not?) for the blanket project, but as I started working the foundation chain, it was just soooo loose that it really didn't look right, so I switched to using a 6.5 mm hook, and that seemed to look a lot better to me. A 7 mm hook would probably be ideal, but I don't have one that size (yet).

The free pattern wasn't yet listed in the Ravelry database when I started this project, but it could be downloaded from this page at Yarnspirations.

Measures about 36 inches wide

Since I'm using a smaller hook than the pattern suggested, I also added more chains to the foundation chain to ensure that the blanket wouldn't be too small. Thus, I started with a foundation chain of 153 instead of 113. After working several rows of blocks, the piece measured about 36 inches wide, which is a good size for the width of a baby crib blanket. This blanket is 14 squares wide. I'm aiming to have the finished blanket size be about 36 inches wide by 48 inches long. I figure I will just keep adding rows until the blanket looks more rectangular than square, so I'll let you know how many rows that ends up being after I've finished.

Work in progress...

I'm also fairly new to tunisian crochet techniques, and I wasn't understanding the written instructions for how to get started, so I looked up this Yarnspirations video tutorial (hosted by Mikey!! Yay!! He's such a great teacher) to get me through the blanket setup. Once I was able to understand how the tunisian block pattern works, it became super fun to make this pattern. It only takes about 4 or 5 minutes to complete each block (it takes about an hour (ish) to complete a whole row of blocks), and as the yarns gradually change colors, half of the fun is seeing which color will come next, so I found myself wanting to keep making "one more block" and never wanting to stop. 😊 The beautiful colors of the Bitty Stripes yarn play so well together, too. It's just a gorgeous effect when it's all put together. 

WIP at 27 rows

I'm using the Seaweed (green) colorway as Color A in the pattern and the Horizon (blue) colorway as Color B. 

The first skein of Seaweed ran out after the 15th row. The first skein of Horizon ran out in the middle of the 16th row. The blanket was basically a square at the point where these first skeins ran out, so if you wanted to use this pattern to make a roughly 36-inch square blanket, you might be able to do it with just one skein of each color (plus more yarn for a border, if you wanted to add one). 

In working out the math for the sizing of this blanket, I calculated that 48 inches is approximately 1.33 times 36 inches. And since 14 squares measures about 36 inches, I estimated that I would need to work 18-19 rows of Color A (or 14 times 1.33) to reach my target length of 48 inches long. Notice that that's only counting the Color A rows. Since the pattern is alternating rows of Color A and Color B, the total number of rows would actually be approximately double the number of rows of counting only Color A, which I'm estimating would be around 36-38 rows of squares. 

Standard hook = crowded

I went through phases of using three different 6.5 mm crochet hooks while stitching this project. I started off with my regular blue-handled Boye hook (this set is one of my overall all-time favorites to work with). Because the squares in this pattern are fairly small and only require a maximum of 7 loops to fit onto the shaft of the hook, it is possible to manage that with most standard crochet hooks, even if 7 loops gets to be a bit crowded. 

A Furls hook helps

I looked around at the options available and thought that the long shaft of the Furls style hooks might work better for this project than my Boye hook, so I ordered a pretty 6.5 mm Furls hook from Amazon. 

All the hooks I went through

When the Furls hook arrived, it was noticeably easier to fit all the loops onto its shaft. But the problem with the Furls design is that the shaft gradually tapers into the larger grip area, and that larger part of the shaft was making the loops on that end of each row bigger than the other loops. It wasn't a huge issue, so I worked quite a few rows with the Furls hook. 

A tunisian hook is ideal

But eventually I decided to finally bite the bullet and buy some type of actual tunisian hook, in the hope that it would make it easier for me to keep the loop sizes more consistent across the entire row. I settled on this double-ended tunisian hook by Red Heart. 

The only reason why it took me so long to finish this blanket was because I struggled somewhat with finding the energy to keep working in the middle of the project (health struggles, sigh), so even though I knew that I really wanted to have it ready to be a gift for Baby's first Christmas, I put it in time out for a few months to let myself rest. But as December rolled around, I found the burst of energy I needed to pick it up again. 

After finishing the 43rd row, I measured the length of the blanket and found that it was just about exactly 48 inches long and celebrated finally reaching my goal.

I had ordered a skein of baby blue Red Heart yarn that looked online like it would coordinate well with the blanket's colors and make a good solid color for the edging rounds. But it was evident as soon as I saw the yarns in person that this edging color was not going to work. Happily, I still had a lot of leftover Red Heart in the Denim colorway, which complements the blanket colors nicely in the border rounds.

For the border, I worked two rounds of SC (turning to work the second round in the opposite direction to help prevent curling) followed by one round of twsted SC, which gives a simple but lovely, texture-y, rope-like edging that I have used to finish many blanket projects. Twisted SC looks exactly like RSC, but twisted SC is a LOT easier to work, IMO. 

How crochet hooks and knitting needles are measured for size

This might be something that is blatantly obvious to everyone else but me, but recently I found myself wondering exactly HOW are crochet hooks and knitting needles measured for size?

Hooks and needles are usually presented with their sizes given in millimeters (for example, a 5.5 mm crochet hook or a set of 7 mm knitting needles). But do those millimeters represent the hook's/needle's CIRCUMFERENCE or DIAMETER???

This issue actually came up when I was working the Harmony Shawl free pattern while camping. I didn't pack all my yarncrafting supplies for the trip, but I had a white plastic 6.5 mm K hook on hand. The pattern actually recommends an 8 mm L hook to create a fabric with a relatively large gauge, however, so I improvised by working each stitch way up on the handle of my K hook, at the point where the handle flattens out and gets wider (see photo below).

Working stitch up on the flattened hilt of a K hook to achieve a larger gauge.

But because I was camping without all of my supplies, I had no way to measure just how big of a stitch I was approximating by working them up on the hilt of my K hook. And then I realized that even if I'd had a measuring tape on hand, I actually didn't know whether the hook's size represented its circumference or its diameter. D'oh!

After we returned home, I searched the Internet for information about how crochet hooks and knitting needles are measured. This Wikipedia article had some interesting information, but it didn't fully answer my question because its statement "Hooks come in various sizes (measured in millimetres or fractions of an inch), according to the thickness of the needle" didn't clarify what it meant by "thickness of the needle." One could still interpret that as either the circumference OR the diameter! ARGH!

So, finally, I pulled out my measuring tape and an I hook (5.5 mm size) and tested the measurements out for myself. As best as I could tell, its circumference measured at 19 mm! That's obviously WAY more millimeters than 5.5!

Next I measured the hook's diameter, and as you can see in the photo below, it's fairly close to 5.5 millimeters.

So, at last, I have my answer for how hooks and needles get their size rating, and in the process, I learned something new. Now I won't have to take those size markings for granted anymore!

And if you've ever wondered the same thing about hook and needle sizes, I hope this post helped you as well. Happy yarncrafting!

P.S. And in case you're wondering what crochet hook size I actually was approximating by working up on the hilt of my K hook, according to the diameter sizing rule, as far as I can tell, that spot on the hook measures at about 10 mm, which is the equivalent of a size N hook.

Hexagon dishcloth free pattern Tunisian crochet

This was my very first attempt to do the Tunisian crochet technique after finding a 5mm Tunisian hook tucked away among the many sets of needles in my mother’s old knitting bag.

I don’t recall ever having seen her use this long afghan hook, although my memory is full of scenes watching her use standard hooks to create large, beautiful afghans for her home and to give as gifts.

Nevertheless, I wanted to try out this newly discovered hook, and a dishcloth seemed like a useful item to make as a learning piece (that was also of a manageable scale to finish quickly and avoid possible discouragement!).

This Tunisian Short Row Dishcloth pattern by Khebhin Gibbons is easy to follow and a great project for beginning Tunisian crocheters like me.

Because I am notorious for not following directions (something about my stubborn streak), instead of whip-stitching the edges together after making the final wedge in the hexagon as instructed, I simply slip-stitched the final edge to the beginning edge.

This brought the unbroken working yarn back to the outside of the hexagon, where I then switched to a standard I hook and added a ruffle made of four rows of a graduated picot trim for a lacy effect.