It's finished!

I finally finished the round baby blanket. I actually finished it a couple days ago but I wanted to wash it before taking a photo. I think it shrunk a tad in the wash, as it's cotton, but that's ok. It's a little over 2 and a half feet accross, small for a blanket but a nice size for a stroller or lap or carseat. I found most baby blankets too big when Teagan was very young, hopefully the recipient feels the same. I was dissapointed in how it wouldn't lay flat, it's not actually a circle, and looks like I could have skipped one of the sections (there were 10) to make it turn out better. Here it is folded in half, you can see how it's bigger around than a circle:

I didn't find any mistakes, so I'm not sure what happened, maybe my row guage was way off or something, I certainly didn't bother with a guage swatch for this.

I enjoyed making this a lot, even though it wasn't difficult or exciting, and I could see making more in the future. The price is right, a whole skein of the veregated cotton I used is around $7, the solids would make a slightly larger blanket for the same price.

I had to rip out about 10 rows of the pinwheel blanket. I got the increases messed up so half the round was on an increase row and half wasn't, and I couldn't find where I went wrong. It might have been ok, or the blanket might have ended up lopsided, and I didn't want to chance it. I'm almost back to where I was, though, since it knits so fast. Good thing, I have 2 weeks to finish this.

I need another quick project too, something I can finish in a week. I was thinking of an apple hat, those are cute and fast, but I have no red yarn. Maybe I can make it to Michael's in the next day or two. I'd love a cotton or cotton blend since it's heading into summer. Wool is warm and acrylic scratchy for a baby.

Here's the pinwheel blanket, as of 2 days ago:

I haven't made a lot of progress since then, maybe 5 rows? It's getting big, barely fitting on the TWO needles even. Since it's a baby blanket it doesn't need to be too big, I'm just going to let the yarn be my guide, I seem to be about 2/3 of the way through the skein now, so when I get nearer the end I'll finish off with some seed stitch. Cara did that with hers and I like how it looks. I don't want anything too frilly for a boy blanket

I'm still really enjoying working on this baby blanket, mindless knitting is a nice break these days. It's about 20inches accross right now. I'm not sure how big to make it, I was thinking about 3 feet would be good. I'll have to measure some baby blankets I have at home to see what a nice size would be. I might need to get a longer needle, or use two. This circular needle is around 36inches (do you measure tip-to-tip? I did) and I can just manage it at the current size. A few more rounds of increases and I don't think it will fit on the needles, I'll have to see if I have a second one this size. Maybe I will see if they make them any bigger, though I don't make a lot of blankets I might be better off just using 2 shorter ones.

I started a new project, because the 50-odd ones going on now weren't enough. I'm making the Pinwheel Baby Blanket in a pretty purple/blue veregated cotton. Here's my progress so far: It's easy to knit, and I love how it looks, we'll see how boring it is in another 20 rounds though. I love the colours, the yarnwas going to be for a top for myself, but that didn't work out. I hope it's "boyish" enough....