Pattern of the (Mid)Week - Round Ripple

New camera means new effects. Lucky us!

Now, I feel a bit mean posting this because I've already talked about crochet blankets before on here and I haven't done nearly enough crochet on this pattern of the week malarkey (it'll be sorted soon enough I promise) and I feel a little bad about posting yet another blanket but I couldn't not show this off and also I wanted to talk about COLOURS! I'm not a fan of this weather but it doe make me want to put COLOURS everywhere! So, first, a photo:

 

 That's as close as you're getting to an FO picture... I tried yesterday, I really tried but it's just too huge! Look:

I thought I'd set it out in the back alley and take a photo from the bedroom but then for some reason I put it behind the gate and Chris was in such a miserable state that I didn't have the heart to ask him to move it. Poor lad got my stinkin' cold.

Anyway, it's finished but the ends aren't sewn in. I must admit, wanting a finished project before I write these posts is killing me. I may be a bit kinder to myself and do swatches or other people's projects in the future...

So, this pattern is the round ripple that I found here. It's a free pattern and it's fairly easy to understand. My advice when you're starting is don't try to understand what it is you're doing, it only becomes clear about four or five rounds in. As always with round blanket patterns, you can absolutely ignore the hook and yarn suggestion because you can just make it to whatever width you like at the time. I used variously a 3.5mm, 4mm, 4.5mm and 5mm depending on what was in my hand bag at the time.

The yarn. I used all old yarn. Stuff that I'd brought over from my house for Chris to use or stuff left from projects or just bits that appeared from nowhere as yarn tends to do around here. I used either dk, aran or chunky depending on my whim and thought that if I allowed it to be really random then it'd all even out in the end and it did, happily.

People are always asking me about my colours and how I put them together. Can you remember the mohair dress? 

 

 Oh how I miss that dress. Well, I wanted to use the same effect here but also use every last scrap of wool that I had. Problem is, with it being pretty much my leftovers in some form or another, it's mainly dark and bright and I ran out of creamy-beige colours at the end. I should definitely have started with them because the smaller amount of yarn would have looked bigger in the middle but I didn't think about it...

 

 So this is how it started on March the 2nd. I took it to the hospital and then soon enough it became too big to take with me anywhere.  Basically, I gathered together all of my darkest colours - blacks, browns, dark green and then I made sure there was a little punctuation - still dark and deep colours - the pink Galaxy Chunky.

I don't know about you but I make bargains with myself whilst I'm crocheting (and knitting). 'I'll just get to the end of this row before I do.... blah blah blah...' or 'I'll keep going until the end of this repeat' or.... as I was telling myself 'I'll do this colour until dinner's ready/the programme finishes/Chris squawks...' and that's how I chose how much of one colour to do. Which was a bad idea because once you get into the bigger rounds:

 

that approach looks much bittier than the middle. Can you see?

 

As I got rid of a ball I'd keep a mental note of how many and then when I was back in the stash I'd grab a few more so each couple of days or so my choices got gradually lighter but because I didn't get rid of all of my colours before introducing new (and therefore more exciting to use) ones I still had remnants of the dark right until nearly the very edge. Honestly, because of the way that the colours combine in something like this you don't have to be an expert. You could literally start with ten balls, pick two up, which one's lighter? Put it to the right, pick another one, compare it and put it more right or more left in comparison, pick up another one. In that way you can get a light/dark scale in seconds.

I'm absolutely thrilled with this, can't wait to sew in the ends although that'll probably never be done, and get it on the bed. The nights are still nippy even though the sun's trying it's best in the day isn't it? Ahhhhhhh. No idea what'll be for Saturday's pattern of the week. I've just been reminded that I had three weeks to knit two pairs of man socks. Better get on with it then...

Love Eleanor. xxxxxx