In Progress: The Blanket That Everyone Wants to Touch

I love sleeping. Immensely.

Perhaps that is the reason behind my affinity for crocheting blankets. Halfway through a massive Brava blanket adventure, I recently started a second hefty blanket, this time in the sumptuous Billow. Straying bravely away from my typical coral-infused color palette, I opted for a beautiful gradation of 6 colors, kicking off with the sunny Cornmeal and winding down with the creamy Natural.

Billow Blanket Yarn

While I forayed into foreign color territory, I stuck with my tried-and-true stitch, the Granny Square, but in stripe version (here is a similar pattern). Overall a fairly motivated person, I am strangely quite content to remain completely unambitious with my crocheting technique. Devoid of any desire to learn new stitches, I crochet purely to move my hands and feel the yarn between my fingers. All I ask for is new yarn and colors, and I will granny stitch until I am actually a granny.

Billow Blanket The blanket measures about 60″ wide, and theoretically will end up around 63″ tall. For each stripe, I use a little under 3 hanks of the color.Billow Striped Blanket

In addition to the smashing color palette, my favorite aspect of this blanket is the whipped cream-like texture of the yarn. It feels like my fingers are getting a gentle massage when I crochet with it. Others can barely keep their hands off it as well. Wherever I take it (which is everywhere I go), hands of friends and strangers alike greedily stroke the plush softness. I don’t blame them – they can’t help it. Just look at it!

Billow close upAnother plus about this uber-easy pattern: it’s simple enough that I can recruit my 8-yr old niece to take over when my wrist grows weary!

 


39 comments

  1. jeanne / May 31, 2013

    Would love to make this at a knit blanket in seed stitch. Would I cast on the same amount of stitches as you chained?

    • Heidi W / June 12, 2013

      Hey, Jeanne! That’s a great idea. I imagine it will be stunning! Make a 4″ x 4″ swatch in seed stitch with Billow. If you want a looser blanket like mine, I would go up two needles sizes (#12-#13). Measure how many stitches per inch, then multiply it by 60″.

      Let us know how to turns out!

  2. Lynn / May 21, 2013

    Too funny- I made a very similar blanket with Crayon, back when it was available (oh how I miss that yarn!)
    http://www.ravelry.com/projects/crazytuffie/granny-stripes

    • Heidi W / May 22, 2013

      Lynn, that blanket is a wonder! I love its punch!

  3. Kaye / May 21, 2013

    What **size** crochet hook did you use for your granny stripe for the Billow yarn ? I love this pattern, I’m working on one right now actually with an acrylic yarn but want to make one out of cotton eventually.

    • Heidi W / May 22, 2013

      Hi, Kaye! I used a 6.5mm 🙂

      • Kaye / May 22, 2013

        thanks Heidi!

  4. Roxanne / May 21, 2013

    Oh, I was almost tempted to buy the yarn to make an afghan like that for me but then I checked the care instructions. I won’t use any yarn that I can’t throw into the washing machine!! Life is too short to hand wash anything! LOL

    • Heidi W / May 22, 2013

      Roxanne, I whole-heartedly share your sentiments about hand washing. I couldn’t resist the allure of Billow, though, so I will most likely regulate this blanket to the couch 🙂

  5. Jodi Dalstrom / May 21, 2013

    OMGoodness I too would LOVE to know where you got the multi colored wood crochet hook….! Wow!

  6. TeaMouse / May 21, 2013

    I love that blanket and everyone is raving about that yarn. I have never done a crochet stripe before but I like you find I am drawn to the basics and for me it is also the feel of the hook and the motion of doing the triple that appeals to me.

    • TeaMouse / May 21, 2013

      How many ch did you begin with to get that size? I am really wanting to do this afghan, I have never done a striped granny.

      • Heidi W / May 21, 2013

        If my memory serves me correctly (which would be a miracle), I did 120 chains. 🙂

  7. Kristen / May 21, 2013

    Beautiful! What are the other colors that you used?

    • Heidi W / May 21, 2013

      Kristen, I used Cornmeal, Ash, Sagebrush, Lichen, Gosling and Natural, in that order.

  8. Regina / May 21, 2013

    did you make more the one stripe of each color. I love the concept of the blanket, but I would like the know how much yarn to order.

    • Heidi W / May 21, 2013

      Regina, I am doing only one massive stripe of each color! So six stripes total, 3 hanks of each color.

      • Regina / May 21, 2013

        Thank you

  9. DWJ / May 20, 2013

    I’d love to know where you got your lovely crochet hook from!

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