Knit Round Adult Snuggle

I have knit this round blanket pattern before for five grandchildren as their "blankie". The following photo shows the five color choices, each made with two strands of Snuggly Wuggly Yarn.

The links for the post for each blanket and the current age of each grandchild are

• 12/16/13 for Vivian (4¾ yrs.),
• 3/21/16 for Lillian  (2¾ yrs.), 
• 12/20/17 for William (8½ mos.), 
• 12/17/16 for Isaiah (3½ yrs.),  
• 08/29/18 for Autumn (6¼ yrs.) 

Then I decided that I too wanted something to snuggle under so I knitted one to keep. I made it slightly larger diameter by almost 15% diameter, casting on 80 stitches instead of 70, and in a color that would go in the family room and match well with my blue leather chair-and-a-half that I tend to fall asleep in (unintentionally of course). Rather than a variegated yarn (as in Vivian's and Lillian's) or two strands of different solids (as in William's, Isaiah's, and Autumn's), I used a double strand of a heather type tweedy Snuggly Wuggly™ yarn in a color called denim, available from Michael's.

The trouble was, when I began to knit it up, it looked flat and boring. I forged ahead with the first of the twelve wedges but was convinced the blanket needed something to jazz it up. I considered I could add interest by adding texture. On the second wedge I introduced a second stitch, ribbing. Both these stitches, garter and ribbing, have the advantage that they look the same from both sides. Also, the variation makes the knitting a bit more exciting and fun.

Having liked the drape and softness in the grandkids' blankets, I used the same needle size I had used for each of the children's. Hmm... or did I? I typically cast on with a needle one size larger than I intend to use throughout because I tend to cast on tightly and this helps some for the first row. I guess I was distracted or whatever but I never substituted out that size 11 needle for a 10½. I was nine wedges into the blanket before I discovered this. I was not about to change then. Besides, I had read a tip that when making a practice swatch to check your gage, if you can get the stitches per inch to match but not the rows per inch, then substitute in a different size knitting needle on alternate rows. This practice will vary the vertical gage but not disturb the horizontal. I was not working to any specific gage here but if folks can use two different needles sizes on purpose with no ill effects, I could forge on ahead for the final three wedges with my 10½ and 11.

Ah, but would this effect my yarn consumption? I had based my yarn quantity on size 10½ needles, and size 11 needles would use up more yarn. So I weighed my blankie with ten wedges completed and it weighed 27 ounces. No, I did not adjust for the weight of the needle but I did tare out the weight of the clear bowl holding the knitting. (After seeing these pictures I cleaned all those dirty fingerprints off my scale, but for now I guess I am busted. Yuck.)

The rounded up quantity of 27 ounces divided 5 wedge pairs calculated out to my needing 5.4 more ounces to complete the final 6th wedge pair of the blanket. Since I'd bought three 14 ounce skeins and had used only 27 ounces out of those 42 ounces, I still had 15 ounces left. Rounding up from 5.4 to be safe, I would need two 3 ounce balls to complete since I use the yarn double stranded. So I weighed my existing yarn ball and wound more from the pull skein accordingly to bring it up to 3 ounces.  Then I wound an additional 3 ounce ball.

When I was finished knitting, those two balls sitting at the bottom of my bag weighed in at 0.3 and 0.4 ounces so my weight guess at how much more I needed to wind out of the big skein was pretty accurate. These fractions of an ounce are approximately the additional weight I rounded up to so as to be safe.

There are 9.5 ounces left on the third 14 ounce skin I'd bought. Obviously there is a lot of waste with the larger skeins, but in this color I had no choice. The size of these pull skeins has another disadvantage. The inner guts pull out in a tangle at the very beginning and the outer windings collapse on themselves as you reach the end of the skein; so I wind most of it in a ball and save myself the tangles from pulling directly as I knit. This color was only available in the store in the large size and not even listed on the store website so I had no choice but to buy the larger skein. With other colors, if available, the smaller size skeins of this yarn is preferable. There is less waste with the 5 ounce skein size (*5) than with the 14 ounce skein size (^14). The yarn I have left over from each of these blankets is:

• Adult pale blue/white tweed (^14)                      0.3 + 0.4 + 9.5 = 10.2 ounces
• Vivian's white/yellow/green variegated (^14)     7.8 ounces
• Lillian's pastel rainbow variegated (^14)            2.9 + 3.0  = 5.9 ounces
• Isaiah's bright lime (^14)                                    14.3 + 0.8 = 15.5 ounces
• Isaiah's lively turquoise (^14)                             13.6+ 1.2  = 14.8 ounces 
• William's light aqua (*5)                                      2.6 ounces 
• William's dark aqua (*5)                                     1.6 + 4.7  = 6.3 ounces 
• Autumn's light pink (*5)                                      2.2 ounces 
• Autumn's medium pink (*5)                                1.8 ounces 

Perhaps some day I can make a scrap throw using most, or even all, of these leftovers of the same weight yarn that total 67 ounces. Hmm... the bright lime, lively turquoise and pale blue might make a pleasing, cool, combination and that is about 40 ounces right there. Maybe four wedges of each color for a bold, pinwheel effect? Sorry, thinking aloud in print, folks.

Here are those twelve completed wedges, in need of joining at that one radial seam to make a circle. I bound off the twelfth wedge, which was in ribbing, by knitted every stitch. I thought that would give a cleaner, smoother edge for joining to the initial cast on row. That spiral shape in the next photo needs to convert to a point in the center surrounded by a drawstring-like snugging up of the last stitch of each of the twelve wedges.

Even with the center defined, I had to be careful when making that one radial seam to do it evenly. The cast on edge and the bound off edge have the same number of stitches but due to a differing lengths when relaxed and not stretched out, sewing that seam can go off kilter.  Starting from the outer edge, I pinned after every 10 stitches going inward, periodically linking the cast on edge of the beginning row and with the bound off edge of the ending row to get even distribution.

Then I sewed down from the center to the outer edge. The cast on edge has "holes" every other stitch so I chanted to myself "hole, non-hole, hole, non-hole" as a zigzagged across to stitch in the bound off edge.

Nearing the home stretch of the outer edge and I still have equal length edges to join. Sweet!

Here is the completed blanket. As I suspected, those ribbed wedges lie differently than the garter stitch wedges and my round blanket but this had the happy happenstance of giving my throw a sort of petalled flower effect. It measure about 58" in diameter, almost five feet. Since I am 5"4" it will work fine for me.

A closer look shows how the garter and ribbing stitches work together. Would I do it again? Not sure, but I like the shape and draping of this knitted throw

I draped it over my blue chair-and-a-half for another photo. Clearly my knitting ability is better than my artful draping ability.

Since my husband is in just about every one completed quilt photos in my blog posts – meaning his finger and toes are visible – I asked him to take a similar pose for me with this knitted completion. My fingers are peeking out at the top and, though you cannot not seem them completely bared, you can tell my toes are poking up at the bottom, too. Aah, time to snuggle.

As I gather up my supplies to put away, something on the blanket catches my eye. Whoops, there is one thread pair I missed burying. I'll do that, post to my blog, link up to MainCrushMonday #142 and Let's Bee Social #257, and then snuggle!