Finished object, mystery object!

Today, my EZ garter stitch baby blanket is finished, all snuggly warm and waiting for a baby to wrap up. No the baby is not here yet, but it must be close, its not my baby, its a friends baby and its only weeks away. I've got a mystery object (courtesy of Suzanne) so a guess what it is and win yummy sock yarn.

The baby blanket is done, all done, cast off, stitched together, and blocked. I wasn't going to block, after all it was thick squishy garter stitch - but after being stitched together it looked rumpled. the edges were ruffled and the seams thick and wrinkly- so I blocked it. I soaked the blanket in hot water with a little wool wash for 10 minutes, then I fulled it, kneaded the wet blanket as if it was bread dough until the double strands of four ply it was knitted with appeared as one.

I had several reasons for fulling the blanket. First the Mum-to-be said no one in her family knitted so a knitted thing would be lovely. I imagined with no knitters, then the skills to wash merino woolen things by hand would not be inherent. I'm not passing any kind of judgment on her blanket keeping skills here - but repeated cleaning knitted baby things of not-super wash merino and keeping them new looking is definitely a learned skill, and one I'd admit I'm still learning. Fulling the blanket takes away any chance of the blanket being washed and accidentally felted, as its already done.

My second reason - was to tighten up the stitches, to remove any chance of little baby fingernails snagging and pulling out loops of yarn, or getting stuck in the longer more open slipped edge stitches. Remember how fine and little and sharp the fingernails of new born babies are? How they snag all sorts of things? How those little skinny fingers get stuck in holes in knitted things? Fulling lessens that risk.


'after spinning the blanket out in the washing machine, I laid it on a clean sheet on the lounge floor to dry, all pinned and stretched flat, mostly to remove the edge ripples. I thought briefly about buying blocking wires, but .... decided that I should just get on with it. After all I was blocking this in my lunch break and had work things to do in the afternoon.



The baby blanket dried fast in the sun, and very flat, the seams melted beautifully into the structure of the garter stitch. I did sew one section in upside down, but with garter stitch, well a novice or non-knitter would probably never notice. I thought that unpicking the seams and re stitching it was foolish after I'd fulled it, the fulling making any changes almost impossible to do.

And so now I have a thick squwooshie garter blanket in sunny warm goldish yellow, just waiting for a baby shower and a baby. Nearly 4" thick of squwooshie warm sunny blanket, a cot sized blanket.

The left overs were tiny, look, only two wee balls of yarn and my swatch left. I had thought of adding an i-cord edging - but given how little yarn is left, will have to leave that for the next blanket.



Suzanne, sent me a little parcel with this yummy sock yarn, for which I am very thankful. American knitters all seem to experience those yarns which we on the far underside of the world only hear about, like Socks that rock. Well Suzanne enables my sock knitting no end, in the past Suzanne has convinced me to knit on two circs, to buy quality circs, and to try sock patterns with extraordinary shaping or construction details, now Suzanne is egging me on to knit more Cat Bordhi socks. She gifted me the CB custom sock kit from her Socks that Rock collection. The kit includes a pattern for a CB designed sock. I love those blues, truly my favorite colours, and they do resemble the colour of the sea, I love water, just love it and the colours of water make me happiest.


The yarn came with the cutest thing, a tiny skein of emergency sock yarn, labeled don't leave home without it.While I won't discuss the 'where are the knitting needles for the sock knitting emergency' the skein is so cute I've installed it on my key ring. Oh I know it is a fragile thing, but I can re-skein it if it snags, and this way I get to have sock yarn with me at all times. I'm also hoping to attract the attention of random sock knitters about town, ones I have not yet met. After all, how could you notice a skein of sock yarn on some ones key chain and not ask 'do you knits socks to'?


Finally, Suzanne's reason for including the sock yarn was to send me this, a knitting tool, what a great use of sock yarn skeins for packaging! . I've decided to tease you all and make identifying the object and its use a game. Leave me a comment saying what this is, and what it is used for - and I'll draw a name out of the entries and send the lucky person a skein of Vintage Purls sock yarn. I'll leave it open to the end of April, and you don't have to get it right to be in the draw. The winner gets to choose the sock yarn colour they like best. Vintage Purls yarns are up for sale on Ravelry, so apologies if you are not a R-groupie yet, you won't be able to see them. These are the same silky soft merino based yarn that I'm knitting Salto socks with.

Take care
S