Crocheting a blanket - tips for a beginner and best pattern/stitch to use?

[flubba]

Hello lovely crafters. I'm new to crocheting and have (finally!) mastered a granny square which looks lovely (having made a few dodgy ones before now!). I've also made a small bag and some booties, so can do a few different stitches, and am planning on starting a smallish blanket (in three or four colours - or shades of blue to be exact).

Would you advise me to go for a granny-square based one, or a ripple one or (and my preference I think) a a granny stripe one?

And do you know which would use the least amount of wool? I started out with acrylic wool (cheapy, cheapy!) but have used a couple of balls of things like debbie bliss cashmerino DK / rowan something or another, having made squares for the Woolly Hugs blankets, so now realise how lovely this kind of wool is, and would love to do a blanket with it but it's soooo £££, and I don't have £££

Thank you.

Rainbow blanket is on hold for 10 days as I'm off abroad for work (supervising teens, plenty of sitting around while they do activities) and it can come with me.

Also, i took custody of the squares for MrsY's blanket on Monday, so need to start that asap.

It's a nearby village flower show o. Saturday, and my mate talked me into entering. So I'm entering Crochet with a pair of bootees (as yet undecided) and Toy with a baby rattle (will pop a pic on my profile shortly)

Bootees: Leather-soled converse or green snakes?

Oh I love your toy rattle! So sweet!

Leather-soled converse is the way I'd go personally. Good luck! You've got a lot on your hands!

The bootees i made ages ago (have half a dozen pairs i sell at craft fairs in varying sizes) so will pick the best of those :)

I also have half a pair of dungarees in nb size hanging off a hook, started those at knit n natter this morning. I'm making the most of being childfree and unemployed while it lasts!

:)

Update, rainbow blanket is finished. 350g wool (50gx7colours) has made a granny stripe blanket 30"x20" plus dc edging in bamboo dk on a 4mm hook, plus enough leftover to (maybe) make a matching rainbow snake toy...

flubba I really recommend this American book. It has some lovely granny square afghans/blankets amongst other types. It was the book that taught me to crochet and I've done quite a few from there. It builds up quickly because everything is crocheted in double.

Show us a pic pidj!

Thanks messy, will take a look at that.

I've started a random pattern stripey blanket, and have now settled into skinny stripes (with double crochets) of navy, turquoise, cream and a soft grey.

sorry I'm a bit late, only just noticed this thread - but I'll add my bit .

I too, am quite a novice crocheter, retaught myself this year( learnt as a teenager) and decided on a granny stripe blanket as i find granny squares quite difficult to look neat .

I'm doing a granny stripebalanket using the attic 24 pack from Masons - £29.50 for 17 balls of lucy's colours including postage so I think they are the cheapest online retailer for stylcraft when you factor the postage into it .

I find the granny stripes really really easy and can do them without too much concentration in front of the telly, which I like.

I must say I do think using style craft really does make a difference it blows all the other acrylics out of the water , it's so much nicer and softer and better colours too, I think.

However I've just had to order a 2nd pack of attic 24 colours as I've got a huge blanket going on !

Planning to do a ripple cushion next in lovely blue and green wool as i can afford that.... i think

I'm off to the out-laws tomorrow, then the blanket gets handed over on Monday but I'll try :)

I think I'll have to give stylecraft a look as my acrylic wool is good, but it is a bit squeaky and the colours aren't what I wanted.

Anyone know which real shops you can get it in?

I haven't seen it anywhere as Ithink most wool shops near me prefer to stock more expensive wools and very little synthetic yarn is on offer . I takes only 2 days to get the yarn when i ordered online, so it's very quick .

anyway i do think you should look at the sylecraft, it's definitely worth waiting for post, the colours are fab !

It's less the waiting for the wool in the post, more that I like to see the colours for myself - I find it really hard buying stuff online as the colours vary from website to website, even for the same actual colour if that makes sense.

I am a lone voice in the Not Liking Stylecraft camp. It's nicer than some but not as nice as I was lead to believe.

Thanks for your input Soup - were you not as impressed with it in terms of texture or colour?

I am hoping it simply suffered badly with humidity (I was making a blanket on holiday). It was better in an air-conditioned environment but the yellow/red shades were very squeaky... less of an issue with the purple/blue ones strangely enough. The Hayfield Bonus orange I had to buy was utterly horrendous though!

I've not unpacked the case with the blanket in yet so I can't say what it's like now.

Colourwise it is fantastic! I am really really hoping it was just the humidity and when I get it out here it will be just as everyone else seems to have found it. At the moment, it's not coming across as any other "cheap" DK yarn. There was one I've used before when I was starting out that was lovely but I can't remember which it was. Apparently not the Hayfield though, judging by the orange.

Apparently Hobbycraft may do a good acrylic DK, or so I was told.

Okay, thanks for letting me know.

I like Sirdar yarns, and they're pretty widely available (near me, i can get them from JL in city, independent dept store 2 mins walk away and Proper Wool Shop 5 miles away)

Apparently the squeakiness goes if you wash the wool first but I'm too lazy to try

I've made a start on my blanket with the fairly squeaky Hayfield and although the skinny stripes look lovely, they're much tougher to feel than the clusters of trebles I was doing before which have stayed lovely and soft. Maybe my tension's too tight?

No, rows of dc are like that. If you can face frogging, maybe 5-10 rows of dc then the rest in htc, then the last 5-10 rows in dc?

I got 4 balls of Patons cotton mix cheap in Latvia last week (90p a ball!!!) and am making a cellular blanket using variations of 3tc sk 1 to make patterns :o

All going on hold for now while i do MrsY's and make the most of not being too elephantine to do DIY!

What on earth is frogging?? sounds rude

Will have to look up all those acronyms, DC I know, but the others?

Frogging is where you have to rip it rip it out because you made a mistake :o

Ch = chain
Sl st = slip stitch
Dc = double crochet
Htc = half treble crochet
Tc = treble crochet
Extc = extended treble crochet
Sk = skip

Ahaa! I like that :o

I've already done some 'frogging' then because I didn't like what I'd created.

Thanks for the abbreviation explanations. I presume these are UK ones?

Yes, that's uk terms.

English dc is american sc, htc is hdc, tc is dc and extc is tc :)

Right, I've just done a bit more frogging (in broad daylight and everything!) and have done two rows of half trebles, which look much lovelier than DCs so thanks for the top tip :)

Yay, glad it worked :)