Blankets for grandchildren

When I decided to do blankets for my grandchildren, I shared them with my knitting guild, and now you have the ideas I was thinking of for each.  This idea gelled for me in September 2019.  Things happened including a move, caring for aging in-laws, caring for a granddaughter, and losing some of the children for whom these blankets were intended due to relationship breakups.  Suffice it to say not all of these are done.  In the move, most have disappeared.  Finished ones?  Lost in the packing.

Blanket 1 is all but finished and ready to wrap.  I have to join the ends of the i-cord bind off, give it a little blocking, and zoom into a box.  I have no clue where this is.

Blanket 2 is currently on the needles for the 3rd time.   Attempt/rejection 1 was in the round as a 10-stitch circle blanket.   Attempt/rejection 2 was a 10-stitch square blanket.  Attempt and success 3 is the dishcloth blanket.  I have no clue where this is.

Blanket 3 will be a feather and fan pattern.  I.  Using the same yarn in a pink with chocolate stripes colorway.   I plan to use the same needle.  Feather and Fan pattern was scrapped for a simple garter stitch.  It is finished and in use.

Blanket 4 will be a zigzag stitch with us yet to be determined the number of stitches between the peak and valley. The yarn is the same in a blue ombre. The needle will be the same.  Yarn is packed from moving and still in an unknown box.

Blanket 5... I might do a center out square again or a dishcloth blanket again since it won't go to the same family.  It might be a circle blanket with spirals of yarn overs each round. But it is up in the air. The yarn is the same as the rest. The colorway is called storm.  The needle will be the same.

I determined I don't want to do the pick-up required for the 10-stitch blankets.

Particulars are yarnspirations Bernat blanket ombré yarn in burgundy ombre.  Same as blanket 1 it has 220 yards per 300g cake. I'm again using US 13 circular needles.

I started with 3 stitches cast on with the long tail cast on.

R1:  k1, kfbf, k1
K2:  k2, yo,  K to end of the row
Repeat r2 until you reach the end of the cake with a whole row.  Repeat this. Kitchener the two halves together with the garter stitch version.  

I'm hoping to find these blankets/yarns this summer so I can get this project done and off to the children left in the family.   If I had any inkling that the blankets would be received and kept, I would have no problem knitting the for the kids who we are not in contact with any longer.  But I don't and have no idea how things would be received.  What would you do in these circumstances?

My Booklist

 Recently, I read a story about a woman who wanted to go to college but couldn't afford it and kept her high school English teacher's reading list.  She figured she would get a liberal arts degree equivalent by reading everything on the list.  This got me thinking about what kind of reading list would be helpful for a knitter or crocheter?  Let's see what kind of list a well-read knitter should read we can put together.

• The Principles of Knitting – June Hemmons Hiatt. 
• The Knitter's Book of Yarn – Clara Parkes. 
• Japanese Knitting Stitch Bible – Hitomi Shida. 
• Knitter's Almanac and Knitting without tears – Elizabeth Zimmermann. 
• A treasury of Knitting Patterns – Barbara G. Walker
• Vogue Knitting - The Ultimate Knitting Book -- Vogue Knitting Magazine
• The Knitter's Book of Knowledge -- Debbie Bliss
• Ultimate Sweater Book -- Amy Herzog
• Stitch 'N' Bitch Nation -- Debbie Stohler
• Knitting Workshop -- Elizabeth Zimmermann

Why are these books on this list?

These books are basics in the knitting world for getting you started learning how to knit.  A few of them will start you with getting a ball of yarn and these needles and here is how you cast on, here is how you do the knit stitch, here is how you bind off.  Let's make this now that you have the knowledge.  

One of these books is a literal encyclopedia.  It shows you many ways to cast on, and do the various stitches (knit, purl, increase, decrease, bind off.  It doesn't do a lot with stitch patterns, but there is an education in drafting a pattern and gauge.  Blocking is also heavily discussed.  (Hint:  We all have our preferences for this.  I'm of the opinion that some things require it like lace and some things don't like garter stitch scarves.)

Stitch Dictionaries are incredibly useful.  With your plain basic garments and accessories, you can add stitch patterns, color work patterns, cables, and lace.......  The sky is the limit in these.  Mix and combine them to your heart's content.  

Knitting and Increases

 Have you considered how many ways there are to increase your knitting?  When I learned to knit at the age of eight, the book I learned from showed only the knit in front and back.  It didn't even clue in the new knitter that a yarn over could be an increase.  Though, I guarantee you I had plenty of those accidentally.  For many knitting years, that was the only increase I used.  In raglans, it was less than satisfactory but I could live with it.  Occasionally I used the yarnover to increase but I was not always happy about the hole, even if it gave a slightly different look.

Let's fast forward to 15 or so years ago.  I had been getting books from the library and thrift stores but not so much online yet.  Usually, there were different increases and decreases in the "special" stitches section and I took note of them.  Now there are a plethora of websites, youtube videos, books, and other resources to show you a huge assortment of increases.

A list of major types of increases would include

• yarnover increases
• bar increases also known as M1 increases
• lifted increases
• working two or more stitches in one stitch
• cast on in the middle of a row

These can be made to lean left or right or just kind of sit there in the middle pushing both sides out.  And to think for so many years I used just the knit in the front and back of a stitch.  But even that was hard for me to get because I knit through the back loop and had twisted stitches. As a child with no one to teach me and a book that didn't show me where I had gone wrong, just the right way to do it the first time, I had a hard time until I got it figured out.  

Please be aware, that there are only two ways to increase crochet.  One is to crochet more than one stitch in the stitch in the row below OR add chain stitches which adds a hole like a yarn over increase.  This doesn't mean that these two can't be used to great effect and artistry.  In the future I will look into these more in depth and show pictures of them.