05-20-2016

I tried this last year and just couldn’t figure out the instructions. Put it away, went on to do different patterns, techniques, learned much in the past year, came back and voila’! Square made! Then I decided to go a shade lighter than ILTY Graymist, so actually started over today, 05/20/2016, with Light Gray.

06-02-2016

4 blocks completed in light gray (plus one more in the darker shade of gray mist for what it’s worth). When steadily crocheting one block takes me a little over 2 hours. 2 skeins of ILTY gets me 4-1/2 blocks

08-18-2016

I put this to the side for a while during my mother’s illness, made a couple of wheelchair wraps for Mom to keep her shoulders warm, otherwise found it difficult to have the desire to crochet much. Yesterday we buried my mother, rejoicing that she is no longer suffering and in pain.

Today I am picking this back up, and just a guess, I think I have approximately 6-7 squares left to make (2-3 weekends of working on it, depending on how focused I stay while crocheting), then join it. So it will be ready for my niece for Christmas.

09-17-2016

Finally finished the last block (I made 20) last night. Today I began joining it. Because the dye lot is just different enough to be noticeable, I chose to use a darker shade for joining/bordering, to pull the eye away from the color difference. Trick the eye into thinking it’s just the light, or something.

I’d rather it was all one solid color, so lesson learned. Buy all the yarn you need at once, don’t buy a little at a time, even if it’s acrylic. ILTY shows in the dye lot difference …. Vanna’s Choice never does, and since I’ve mostly used VC, that’s why I thought acrylics wouldn’t show dye lot differences.

I love the fact that no matter how long you’ve been doing something, you never stop learning. Or finding ways around things, like using the darker shade for joining/bordering.

10-20-2016

Bought two 16x16 down pillow forms, so now also doing the matching pillows.

11-11-2016

Finished, washed on delicate, dried, photographed.

For the border, I was just too leary of fringe, afraid it would fuzz up and look all nappy with me not there to fix it for her. So, I put this booger in time-out until just the other day, in a state of near-sleep, scrolling through Instagram, something triggered inspiration. Turns out I did nothing even remotely similar, but sometimes all you need is something to trigger you!

I simply did a sc in back loop only (added just that hint of a rope-like texture) in the dark gray, then came back in the lightest gray with a round of DC, then a round of (2FPDC, 2sc) around, also in the lightest gray. Then the final round was a repeat of the (2FPDC, 2sc) around in a slightly darker gray. Using the FPDC in the border like that brought the same stitches used throughout the blanket blocks right out into the border, and really brought it together, I think.

So instead of a solid-colored textural throw blanket, I have a shades of gray textural blanket, and the finished product is something I’m quite happy with.

P.S. I’m stitching a 16x16 pillow together now. I purchased some feather pillow forms off Amazon, plus some gray pillowcases from Wal-Mart (to help contain the feather pillows, and keep the white from peeking through), and I’m stitching the two blocks onto the form right now.