So the other week I got a message from a friend saying ‘you have nice yarns in your shop’. I was like yes we do! ‘Nice yarns for a baby?’ a reply came. I was like definitely! It turns out that she wanted to gift a baby blanket to a friend. So after a few messages back and forth she asked me if I would make it for her. I said why not and as my friend is a talented painter we agreed to a trade. I enjoy trading craft skills, especially between friends. I would knit a blanket and she would pay me in the form of a painting. So let the knitting begin!

So I began by sending some pictures through of my favourite yarns for babies. Of course we know that almost everything is suitable for a baby but when I’m knitting for other people I like to focus on a few particular things. Care, texture and feel. My top picks for those are: Fyberspates Vivacious DK and 4ply, Socks Yeah DK and 4ply and Pickles Økologisk Bomull. I was leaning more towards the DK yarns because it would be a little quicker to knit. After looking over colours we landed on Pickles Økologisk Bomull in the yellows and greens for a woodland type theme. I was excited because I’ve not knit with the Pickles cotton yet so it would be a fun experience for me. I chose the colours Sol, Honning, Kitt, Pistaj and Bomullseng.

Here is an excerpt from my earlier blog post Exploring Pickles Økologisk Bomull if you want to get to know this yarn a little closer:

Pickles Økologisk Bomull is a DK weight 100% Cotton. This yarn has so many interesting qualities it’s hard to know where to start. First I will explore the structure. It’s created from plying together two different thicknesses, one super fine and one heavier. This creates a yarn that has a gentle wave to it. Unlike a bouclé or crimped yarn this wavy texture is not overly dominate in the finished knitted fabric but gives it a slightly undulating look. The clever thing about plying in this way is that it has made the yarn so buttery smooth. Unlike a lot of cottons that are made by tightly twisting strands of a similar thickness together, which make them dense and cord like. By having two plys of different weights the yarn feels soft and airy almost like a single ply. By having a finer ply twisted in you get the structure and strength of a plied yarn but not compromising on softness.

Now for a pattern! My go to designers and baby knits in general are Tin Can Knits. So looking through Ravelry at DK/Worsted patterns for baby blankets led me straight to Bounce (link to Ravelry). It was perfect, knit all in one piece so no sewing up. It has an engaging lace pattern that was interesting but not taxing and it was done in stripes so I could include all the nice colours. So I set about doing a little swatch to check I was getting the fabric I liked rather than worrying too much about gauge (I never worry about gauge on a project like this!). The swatch below is knit on 4.5mm and blocked out so I could check that it held its shape well. It was looking great so time to start.

The pattern itself has two sizes for either a stroller or throw. I wanted a size around 80x80cm so I cast on for the larger size and knit to the length of the smaller size. The lace repeat is worked over eight rows which is bordered by simple garter stitch. After a couple of repeats I had it easily memorised so it was really simple from there on out. It’s the sort of design where you can ‘read your knitting’ if you go a little off. The decreases that create the prominent ridge of v’s have to remain aligned in order for the design to flow. A couple of times I noticed I missed a yarn over on my last row throwing off the alignment. This was easily remedied by doing a make 1 stitch just before the decreases when working the first row of your new colour and you would never know!

I ended up using two hanks of the Sol, Honning and three Bomullseng and one hank of Kitt and Pistaj. I got seventeen stripes in total and could certainly have added more yellow ones but it would have throw off the repeat. Each colour stripe took about 14g of yarn. I did play a bit of yarn chicken towards the end and my last stripe was two rows short of being complete. But I think you would only notice if you looked closely.

My finished blanket measures 77 x 84cm and weighs 380g. I’m really please because it only took me a week. I had two very long coach trips and also my train ride in to work gave me plenty of good knitting time.