Knitting: can I substitute this wool?

[SevenElvesAndAReindeer]

I want to knit a baby blanket (currently 18 weeks pregnant). I've found a lovely pattern which uses Rowan wool cotton, it's 50% cotton and 50% merino wool. The trouble is a couple of places I've looked at online it's over £5 for a 50g ball, and I need around 20 of them! Can I just substitute it for 100% cotton or a cotton acrylic blend?

Thanks

Yes, you can substitute but try and get something of a similar weight (and I would always rather my babies wrapped in natural fibres). If you search yarn in ravelry it will tell you weight of yarn and length per ball, so you know how much yardage needed of substituting.

I don't see why not - but check the yardage of the original yarn and buy the same number of yards on your substitute rather than going by a certain number of balls.

If you opt for pure cotton, it is heavy so you won't get as many yards for the same weight and will need extra balls.

If you can afford to stretch to the wool cotton I would, it's gorgeously soft - I knitted my DS a blanket with it and it's way nicer than just cotton. Have a scout around to see if there's any reduced online.

Black sheep have out for 4.95 a ball.

It is lovely, but I would be tempted to swap it out on the grounds of puking. Hopefully your baby won't be a champion puker but if you're going to end up washing it a lot you don't want something that needs aftercare or takes a while to dry. I would substitute with a cotton/acrylic for that reason, or possibly a bamboo.

Rowan Wool Cotton is a double knitting weight yarn, so you want something the same - their 100% cotton is considerably cheaper. The Bamboo Cotton from King Cole should be nice and soft, those are 100g balls so you'd only need 10. Sirdar Recycled looks good, but I'm not a big fan of the Calico, it's a bit on the thin side and not very snuggly.

This is on sale and is the same mix ianthe but is hand wash only. Lovely colours

Thanks all, I've worked out the yardage and the King Cole bamboo cotton would save me £50, but the rowan handknit cotton only works out £10 cheaper as the yardage is less. I'm going wool shopping tomorrow so will have to see what there is, but basically I can use any DK wool as long as I work out the correct yardage?

If you're going out to the actual shops looking for yarn a lot may depend on where you are, SevenElves.

You can certainly use any old DK you like (indeed for a blanket, even a change of yarn weight isn't the end of the world, you'll just end up with a blanket smaller or bigger than the pattern intended - but you'll need different sized needles as well). Have a squeeze of a few balls (no pun intended) and see what you fancy. Round here I have a choice of Hobbycraft (not a bad selection, but not a lot off the list discussed above) and a lovely local yarn shop that wisely doesn't try and compete on the bargain brands and stocks wonderful MASSIVELY expensive yarn suitable for projects for oneself and not a baby :) The internet is probably your best bet once you've been out and had a look to see what there is.

Deramores has 15% off all baby yarn (enter code BABY15) but there are lots of other places to buy online.

Yes, any dk yarn should be fine as long as you get the same yardage.

Ok thanks. I normally use John Lewis, tbh I like to actually look at it as I have ordered online before and the colour hasn't been exactly what I was expecting. I'll order online if I can't get any I like.