the hexagon blanket odyssey is finally over

Yesterday I have finally finished my hexagon blanket. Phew. I have been working on this blanket since 2011... Well, it is not finished the way I wanted it to be finished but I just can't bear working on it any longer. It was meant to be a single bed cover but is now a big lap blanket. I must say, this is one of the most boring projects I have ever embarked upon. I am not easily bored! Here is the link to my Ravelry project page, where you can also find more notes on the actual knitting (should you be so inclined to embark on this blanket project yourself). The pattern is Bobby's Garden by Megan Rogers. I would probably not follow it again should I ever want to knit a hexagon blanket again. There are some mistakes and the construction is a bit odd. It might of course be my interpretation that is wrong, not the pattern...

I have chosen Noro Kureyon wool for the blanket. Noro yarn is just so beautiful, it begs to be knitted. I really love the changing colours, creating interesting blocks even if the pattern is just stockinette.

Anyway, here it goes: the hexagons are knitted in the round, which suits me perfectly because I don't like to purl. The hexagons are added sequentially by picking up stitches from the adjacent hexagons. Simple and clever, no seams to worry about. These are my first two hexagons:

I blocked the first two hexagons in a "proper" way to see how it would look but then did my usual rushed blocking with my trusted steam iron.

The pattern suggested to work in circles, which I did for the first round. However, I couldn't see the advantage of continuing to add hexagons in concentric circles and continued to add them in rows instead. It seems so much more logical. At some point, the circle would need to be converted into a rectangle anyway. This is how the first circle looked like:

And this is how I left the blanket for months, before picking up the needles again sometimes in 2012:

I had lots of Noro Kureyon leftovers from a previous blanket project (see my "Omama" blanket on Ravelry), my first ever crochet project. I also picket up balls here and there, on Ebay and in the sales. The colours are a bit random but I like it that way. The weather is as usual appalling and the street lights were still on at 9 am... I dashed out to take a quick photo in the little daylight we have at the moment (during a three minute dry spell). Not a great picture but a picture nonetheless.

And here another picture with the blanket neatly folded up. The worst bits  to knits were the partial hexagons to make a straight line.

I have been thinking about a suitable border for a long time. The pattern actually suggests a knitted border, knitted in four parts, one for each side. Considering that the pattern is for a queen sized blanket, this is a quite an undertaking with hundreds of stitches on a needle. An undertaking I wasn't prepared to even consider. In the end, I chose a simple border of one round of single crochet, using up some New Lanark Aran yarn I already had.

  

I am so relieved that I have finished this blanket! If you have read my previous post, you will have noticed that finishing it was one of my goals for this year. I knew of course at the time that I was nearly finished but it is good to have something on your list of goals that is achievable before all the good will and energy are used up (usually by the 10th of January).

Have a lovely Monday! Cx