Vintage Sampler Blanket Ta-dah!

This ta-dah post has been a long time coming. I actually finished the blanket almost two years ago(!) but there was a rather big blip in my blogging at that point, so I didn’t get round to doing a write up, or even taking photos, of my finished beauty.

I had been inspired by Sandra Cherry Heart’s Sampler Blanket, and had spent a long time drooling over the colours and patterns she had used. But for a long time I didn’t seriously consider making one of my own. I knew it would take a long time and, as I was still teaching at that point, time was something I just didn’t have!

However, that summer mum turned 60 and she wanted to celebrate with a family holiday to France where her brother and sister-in-law live. That meant several hours on a ferry plus many more hours in a car with my parents and brother – and I knew that I’d need to take something to keep me busy and occupied all that time!

So I started planning which colours and patterns I wanted to use and had a lot of fun buying yarn and working out how I wanted my blanket to look! I used ten different colours and twenty different patterns, mainly from Jan Eaton’s 200 Crochet Blocks, although with a few other patterns thrown in for interest. I used my lovely Cath Kidston notebook to keep track of alterations I made along the way (some of the squares came out either bigger or smaller than the rest, so I adapted them to make each one the same size).

By the end of the summer holiday I had a great stack of squares ready to be joined. In true style, they sat on my windowsill for longer than necessary before I got round to joining them! I had an idea for a join but couldn’t find anything that looked how I wanted it to. In the end I made it up as I went along – and I’m really pleased with how it turned out!

I used the same border as Sandra used, number 93 from Edie Eckman’s Around the Corner Crochet Borders.

It’s quite an enormous being, probably the biggest thing I’ve ever crocheted! I made a total of 80 squares, each one about 7 inches square. The entire blanket measures 175 x 215 cm and doesn’t fit into even my biggest floor space without the corners having to be curled in!

I think she’s probably my favourite ever make, partly because she’s just beautiful to look at, partly because she’s huge but I still managed to finish her in less than four months (I think – I can’t remember exactly when I completed her!) and partly because she holds memories of that holiday in France.

She generally hangs out in my living room, but she looks pretty great just about anywhere! And Maisie’s a fan too…