Leaves and Lace Blanket - Eventually!

Can you cast your mind back to your first post-lockdown outing, when you were finally allowed to travel more than 5 miles from home?  I remember mine very well.  On 5th July 2020 I drove 30 miles to Stonehaven from Oldmeldrum to shop at Baa!, my (relatively) local yarn store.  Small shops operated by appointment only and I had a precious half hour in which to squish, choose and buy.

Prior to my visit, I'd perused Baa!'s extensive online store at length to optimise my shopping time and I  left with a large bag of Scheepjes Aran yarn, happy in the knowledge I could make a blanket for my sister-in-law's birthday the following month.  

The only trouble was I'd bought the wrong yarn!

Blame the yarn fumes, I was so overjoyed to be out again, shopping in person, that I'd forgotten that the Scheepjes cotton comes in Stone Washed and Stone Washed XL with very similar ball bands.  

I went straight for the weightier version, ignoring my carefully planned shopping list for its lighter cousin, chose my colours and gleefully left the shop with a minute to spare.  It was only on the drive home that doubt began to creep in.  If I'd bought the thicker yarn I'd need twice as many balls for the blanket as the yardage was so different.  Baa!'s proprietor, Janice, could not have been more understanding and a parcel of the correct yarn for my blanket was posted out and was with me within days.  

All's wool that ends wool - you can read about that blanket here.  But the wrongly purchased yarn weighed heavily on my mind.  Janice had kindly offered to take it all back and swap it for the supplies I needed but, truth be told, I was a bit embarrassed that I'd made such a silly mistake.  I decided to keep it.

Time rolled along in my crafting life and I continued to knit, crochet and be inspired by other makers.  Catching up with Sam on the BetsyMakes back catalogue of podcasts, I saw her crocheting beautiful lace doilies, or mandalas, following a pattern by Haafner Linssen.  Each was a different colour and she crocheted them together into a bedspread, following a project in Haafner's book 'Mandalas to Crochet'.  I owned this very book, having received it as a Christmas gift from my thoughtful husband back in 2019.  

Could this be the inspiration my errant yarn had been waiting for?

I decided to have a go and see if one ball of  my rogue Scheepjes XL was enough to make one motif.

Why, yes it did.  I made my first Leaves and Lace mandala as the pattern stated with a contrast centre - then made another centre to prove one ball would make one entire motif.

After completing my first motif in March 2021, I worked on this project on and off for many months.  With no deadline in mind, I was able to lift and lay these motifs, enjoy some relaxing crochet when I felt like it.

Crochet on planes and trains

It proved to be a great on-the-go project as I only needed to take one ball with me.  It was very satisfying to complete one whole hexagon doily with just one ball of yarn.

These three motifs were completed during our week on Davaar Island in the summer of 2021 (when the sun did shine some of the time!)

With lots of hexagons complete, I needed a plan for the joining round and to help me with colour placement.

So I made a paper representation of the Leaves and Lace blanket and cut out shapes for the number of full hexagon motifs I'd finished then taped a wee bit of coloured yarn onto each.  When I was happy with the layout, I glued them in place.  Who knew tape and glue would be integral to my crochet project?

I still had lots of  half hexagons to make to fill in the edges and complete the rectangle.

The plan was a godsend when joining everything together.  So was the spare bed!

I was beginning to feel like the end was in sight.

But this photo was taken in May 2022 and it's the last one I took of my unfinished Leaves and Lace blanket.  Since then, I completed all the joining up, and crocheted round the whole blanket three times to make a deep border, but failed to record any of this progress.  Despite being so close to the end, I stalled at the very last round of decorative picot stitches and have no idea why.  In hindsight I realise I didn't really like the frilly finish in the pattern.

So last week I Googled 'Easy crochet blanket edge' - which I probably should've done months ago! 

I found this easy-to-follow tutorial and four evenings later, the border was all done.  I'm eye-rolling at myself for not just getting on with it but the biggest crochet project I've ever undertaken is now complete.  

I took the chance to show off my Leaves and Lace blanket in the snow!

Then laid it out on the spare bed.  

This might not be its final home but I can enjoy admiring it here for the time being!

You can read find details of the colours I used on my Ravelry project page