Log Cabin Baby Blanket: March 2007 Archives
Log Cabin Baby Blanket Specs
Yarn: Blue Moon Socks that Rock Heavyweight, Tanzanite, Stonewash and Jade
Needles: US Size 5 (3.75 mm) Denise Interchangables
Finished Size: 36" x 36"
It's always nice for me when I can finish up a project when there's still some sunshine to take pictures with. And it was almost a picture perfect, spring is coming sort of weekend here in Chicago. The blankie and I got to stretch out in 60F weather. I'm hoping that this weather is not just a cruel trick and is really the start of spring here in the Great Lakes region.
Unfortunately, even though the weather was nice enough for Chicagoans in my neighborhood to be sitting in outdoor cafes drinking beer it was still a bit wet and muddy to take the Blankie anywhere but onto the balcony off our master bedroom.
Here is the Blankie showing how compact it can be.
In the end, I opted for the reverse crochet or crab stitch for the edging. It provided a solid and durable structural edge without being too frilly or girly. I thought the dark purple was the best choice for the edge. As nice as it would have been to have worked with a 4th contrasting color for the border, this yarn is just a little bit too expensive to justify buying an extra skein of just for 5-10 yards to seam and edge the blanket with -- and I didn't want to edge it with a different yarn, because I expect this blanket to be washed and I wanted all the yarn to behave the same way when it underwent that process.. And I thought the purple really helped to pop the squares it touched.
Four Corners Meet In the Blankie
Very pretty and very even on the front, I think. I'll just say that I was very pleased with the intersections of the squares.
Assembling these squares turned out to be something that was helped along greatly by my first quilting class. First, I made sure that all the squares were oriented the same way, then I connected the edges of the squares in each of the three rows across and then seamed the rows together -- exactly how I put Serenity together.
When it came to seaming, I decided to use a crochet joining method. I picked it for two reasons. 1) It's durable and I was worried that my whip-stitching might not hold up to long term use and machine laundering. 2) If my friend, an excellent knitter, should ever want to deconstruct the blanket into it's component squares, the crochet edging and chain seaming will be trivial to pull out. I know it sounds strange to anticipate this, but I figure there's always the possibility that pieces of the blanket will wear out and not be worth keeping, while other pieces might still be worth preserving and using to create a pillow or some all small memory -- or even just replacing a region. I have plenty of yarn left and could probably create three more squares from what I have left. So, making it easy to take apart seemed like a reasonable idea.
This last is just a picture of what I think is the natural habitat of the blankie -- the rocking chair. It is also an excuse to squeeze another picture in of my favorite piece of furniture ever, and to provide a sense of scale for the size of the blanket. And since I spent a good deal of time seaming in this chair, I couldn't help but notice how handsome the blanket looked against the chair. But, I'm biased. I think everything goes well with walnut.
Soon soon soon this blankie will make its way to its new home in Madison, Wisconsin. Love ya, Judy*! John and I just can't wait to meet your son. May he grow strong and be healthy and be a constant source of light in your life.
* This may seem like I am spoiling a big surprise... but I suspect that Judy lurks here every now and again, and I think I've dropped enough hints to make it clear where this blanket was destined for. When you like to make things (and Judy does -- she painted a lovely picture for my husband and I when we got married and she's knit no shortage of lovely sweaters) I like to think that it makes a project even more interesting when you get to watch it come together. Besides, I'm pretty lousy at the whole keeping secrets thing.
All nine squares completed and the baby is still about a month away. Only the seaming and edging remains. I'm thinking that to seam them together, I will probably try to use a crochet seaming method. I think it will create a nice look on the wrong side of the blanket. I still haven't decided, however, how I will decide what color to use for the seaming. Since no two edges will ever be the same color (the layout above is pretty much the same as the layout I will be seaming together) I'm ultimately probably just going to have to decide to always use the darker color or always use the lighter color or maybe even to use the color that's not represented. I'm also tempted just to use one color throughout and call it a "design element" since the crochet chains will be visible on the wrong side.
For the edging, I'm toying with the idea of just using a nice single crochet. It will be simple and strong. I like single crochet edgings because they almost look like a bound edge and the firmness of crochet tends to hold knitted structures together well. Also, since I know the baby to be is of the masculine persuasion, I don't want anything too frilly -- and, to be honest, I'm not sure I have the patience for 144 inches of applied I-cord.
