The Frosted Pearl Blanket Pattern is here

Hello friends. It seems like a lifetime in the writing, but I’m so pleased to say the pattern is now published in my Etsy shop.

Here is the link- The Frosted Pearl Blanket Pattern

Never again will I take a break half way through the process – (you’ll remember I took December off to make some Christmas gifts) – because you lose the momentum and it’s so difficult to get the brain back into gear.

I have to say I loved making the blanket. The colours are so different to what I’d been using before and the pattern worked up so fast, it was a pleasure to see it appearing before my eyes. And I absolutely adore it as a focal point in the bedroom – now that the pattern is off my hands.

It has been finished for months. In fact it only took six weeks to make and I started in September, but I haven’t been able to actually enjoy it as a finished piece until now, as I got stuck into pattern writing as soon as the last stitch came off the hook. I knew that I would need to keep referring to the blanket while doing the writing, so it lay in an untidy heap at my feet all the time, occasionally being spread out on the floor if I was taking a photo.

However yesterday it had its pamper wash at last and as always, thanks to the Stylecraft and Deramores yarns I used, it came out of the washing machine sparkling clean, perfectly flat and looking absolutely beautiful. (See my previous Frosted Pearl blogpost for the complete Yarn List).

This is it on a double bed to show the size. It’s a big ‘un, 68” square approx.

Did I say how much I love the look of it? I keep popping into the bedroom to gaze at it (sad person) and marvel at how the colours change so much with the light. (That was what made it such a nightmare to photograph, by the way.) And I’m tempted to make a second one, in a totally different colour scheme, but I’ll have a break and do something else first.

I hope you like it enough to give the pattern a try. You will find that it’s not a difficult one to follow and it works up quickly, as I said. That’s because it uses a third less stitches than a normal granny square and that of course means it takes a third less time and a third less yarn! It’s also a pattern suitable for someone who hasn’t done a lot of crochet before – simple stitches and lots of photos, plus some video tutorials you can access which take you through different parts of the pattern. All good.

Footnote – The cushion you see in the photo was a way of using up the bits and pieces of leftover yarn. I started with one of the squares from the blanket pattern in the centre, then just worked around it with small squares and areas of plain granny stitch until I reached the size I wanted. Then I attached some of the little flowers from the blanket too.

I’m not a huge fan of having to crochet a back for it – too lazy to be honest – so I chose a method I’ve used before and decided to attach the crochet front to an actual cushion.

It needed to be a plain cushion, the right size of course and most importantly have a piped edging. I was lucky enough to find the perfect answer on Ebay, after a quick search on Google. This particular company sells the covers either on their own or as a complete cushion with pad and there is a wide choice of colours.

Here is the link to the Ebay shop – Luxury Plain Velvet Piped Cushions

I chose the mink shade and a 22” size, and was delighted when it arrived. It has a luxurious velvety feel and is remarkably well made for the price. In fact it was only £2 more to buy the whole cushion than a similar size pad only, from Amazon.

Here are one or two tips for sewing the crochet front to the cushion. The crochet has to be the exact size, too big is no good. I added one or two rounds of granny stitch until it got to the right size.

In order to make sure it was straight, I pinned the four corners in position first. (By the way, I attached the crochet with the pad still in the cushion.) Then I put a pin in the middle of each side, checked it was straight and then pinned all the way round.

I used the 4 ply cream yarn from the blanket, a needle with a large eye and sharp point (darning needle) and starting from one corner, slip stitched all the way round and right up against the piped edging. Using the yarn to sew with, rather than ordinary thread meant that it held firmly without slipping and it disappeared satisfactorily into the crochet. I think It took me an hour to stitch all the way round.

I don’t tend to wash cushion covers all that often, (if at all to be honest!) as there no children or pets in the house, but I reckon that if I had to, I could wash the cushion without having to remove the crochet. The cover is washable, as is the yarn, so a hand wash and drip dry should be fine. Just remember to make sure the zip is on the back when you sew it on – I nearly made that mistake, which would have been a problem trying to get the pad out to wash!

So there we have it – my finished double bed sized blanket and a matching cushion.

I’m now going to tidy away the little leftover scraps of pastel coloured yarns and have a lot of fun selecting something totally different, and probably a lot brighter for my next project!