Baby Henry's Blanket

Mollie, Sarah W., Sarah H. and I have been working on knitting a group baby blanket for Andy and Angela's new little guy, Henry. We decided each of us would knit three 10-inch squares, and then we'd sew them all together to make a blanket of love. I got a little excited and made five squares, but it worked out because Mollie had done extra too, and Sarah had lost one of her squares.

I thought this would be a good time to try out some new lace patterns, so I turned to the internet. But first I cranked this one out in no time, because I was starting to get anxious about how quickly the baby shower was coming up and I knew this one would be fast, since I had used this dropped-yarn-over pattern on a scarf before.

Also, in order to make faster progress, I used size 10 needles and worsted weight yarn for all of my squares. It was a welcome relief from the sweater I had been knitting for Baby Shae on size 3 needles. I drug my feet for too long on that one, and she has now grown too big for it. I guess I'll have to finish it up and find a doll that it fits and give it to her that way. What a disappointment.

Next I tried out this checkerboard lace pattern from The Purl Bee. I tried a couple of the suggested multiples of 10 plus 8 cast-on stitches, and ended up coming closest to 10 inches with 38 cast-on stitches.

Again, I was nervous about the amount of time I had left to do two more squares, so I threw this in my bag every morning and knat on the 15-minute train ride to and from work every day. This pattern required lots of counting and concentration, which can be hard on the train, so if you look close you'll see some imperfections.

My third square also came from a Purl Bee pattern. I found a pattern for Pretty Lace Handwarmers, and adapted the lace to a square. It took a bit of noodling to turn an in-the-round pattern into a flat pattern, but I ended up just starting and ending each row with two knit stitches to create an edge, and it worked out fine.

The fourth square came from Purl Bee again: April Showers lace. I guess I have become a fan! This one was a little harder than the last one, but not nearly as tough as the checkerboard lace. I found my row counter before I got started on this one, which helped a lot. I started with 39 cast-on stitches. The trickiest part here was the top of the little shells. It required knitting four together, which was a lot for me to get my needle through without accidentally dropping all the stitches.

Since I was on a roll, I kept going and decided to give the checkerboard pattern another try. This time I didn't screw it up.

The baby shower was today, so we all got together on Thursday night to lay out our squares and sew them together. We didn't get it finished in time, so we gave it to her unfinished and immediately asked for it back. Stay tuned for a picture of the final final project.