New covers for some nude cushions in our living room. I am in love with laundered quilting right now. All that squashy wrinkled fabric between rows of neat stitches just makes me feel cozy. I didn't want my covers to shrink later on so I actually washed these before sewing the quilted pieces together to make the covers (I ran a zig-zag stitch around the raw edges to cut down on the amount of fuzz in my washer).

I'm loving patchwork too - especially the sort of random looking stuff. I wanted these to look a little more structured so they are based on two traditional piecing patterns. The green pillow uses a log cabin block and the brown one is stacked coins (turn your head sideways). It was a lot of fun to work randomly within the limitations of the two designs. I love the way piecing and quilting can transform fabrics I no longer really care for into larger pieces I love to see in our house.

I'm really pleased with the way these turned out. They add a nice warm feeling to our living room that works perfectly with the snow falling outside (off and on all day today - the streets are shiny with ice). They are a touch loose but I'm going to use them for a while before I decide if they are actually too big.

Pattern: Hemlock Ring Blanket adapted by Jared Flood
Yarn: Patons Classic Wool
Size: As written
Yardage: 2.5 skeins
Needles: 4.00 mm

I'm very glad to finally be done this project. I really enjoyed working on it - it's a perfect balance of mindless and pattern knitting - but with my currently limited knitting time it just took too long. I wanted to move on to other things and my basket is only so big.

My favourite part of the knitting was probably the flower petals. Most of the lace patterns I've done have involved charts so I could see what I was going to be knitting but this pattern is all text. I didn't even know I was making petals until I was past them and stretched out the fabric. So cool. I love the big gaps at the petal bases too; they looked like they were going to be really annoying to do - like casting off and casting on again or something like that - but they are just yarn overs with lots of stitches in them. So easy.


The cast off is really nice too. It uses the same yarn over technique as the petal bases but is fiddlier because there is a lot of turning involved; I spent most of the time I was working on it trying to decide if I could alter it to involve less turning. I had plenty of time to contemplate it too because it took me most of four hours to do the cast off! It's the first time I've taken more than one sitting to cast something off. It also took a lot of yarn; I joined in the last ball half way through the last plain round of knitting just before the cast off and still used almost half of it. All those little loops made blocking the blanket really easy though.

After blocking and relaxing my blanket is just under a metre (about 38") across at the widest point. It's a lot smaller than I'd expected it to turn out but then again I never once checked gauge. It might work for a small shawl but will probably end up either in the hope chest or being frogged and reknit. I'd like to knit this pattern again at a larger gauge -- maybe 5.00 mm or 5.50 mm - to get something more like a lap blanket but I'm not sure if I want to do it again right away; I'll probably wait for a while, and maybe get a another colour or a slightly heavier yarn.


Abby gave the blanket instant approval (and a taste test).

I am, I hope, on the very last pattern repeat for my Hemlock Ring blanket. This project seems to have been taking forever but that's just because my knitting time is a little curtailed at the moment - Abby and yarn do not mix well. It hasn't been very well documented on here because, well, it basically looks the same as it did in does in the first picture but bigger and slightly lumpier.

I'm really looking forward to finishing this blanket. It will be good to actually finish a big project for the first time is ages. It's also going to be fun to block out and see the lace for the first time (I always love that). Since it is a knitted blanket it will probably reside in the bedroom until we can trust Abby enough to have it on the couch (the bedroom is off limits as Zeke's sanctuary). I have a feeling it will be a nice shawl on chilly mornings too; perfect with a cup of coffee.