Harmony Sunburst Granny, WIP

What a wonderful collection of words: Harmony Sunburst Granny.

Harmony – the colours I am using are from the Attic 24 Harmony Blanket Pack which is available from Wool Warehouse. It is 100% acrylic (shock horror) and really good value for money. I will confess that there are some colours in there that I would never pick and I still hesitate when I pull some of them at random from my bag. Clematis is a rather sickly purplish pink and Cloud Blue is a classic baby blue like your granny would choose. They do, however, all hang together rather cleverly and the Parma Violet background makes the colours really pop out. It looks grey by artificial light, but I don’t mind that, I think greyish tones make a really effective background for other colours.

I am really enjoying the surprising colour combinations that emerge; who knew that petrol and lime could work so well together, or raspberry and turquoise. I am also surprised at how much I like this blanket, it makes me happy every time I look at it.

The yarn is Stylecraft special DK – Plum : Raspberry : Violet : Pale Rose : Lavender : Clematis :Lime : Meadow : Sage : Aster : Turquoise : Cloud Blue : Petrol : Storm Blue :
Parma Violet

Sunburst – this is a pattern that is widely available on the internet. I chose it because I am making the blanket for my 7 year old daughter and I wanted something that would appeal to her now but also stand the test of time so that she can keep it forever.

Its combination of puff stitch and cluster stitch really does make it pop out like a sunburst and it does lend itself well to my particular brand of tight, anally retentively neat crochet. I have also become a bit obsessed with my ends and have now perfected the art of doing the whole square with only that last end to sew in, I hate sewing in ends. The main issue with this blanket is that the squares are really quite small so it is taking bloody ages to finish, excuse my french. I am using a flat crochet join which I think brings blankets together as a whole, rather than a whole load of squares.

Granny – I wanted to make something that has the timeless, vintage feel of a granny squares blanket but not just boring old granny squares. I think this pattern and the careful selection of colours, for which I can claim no credit at all, makes for a much more special blanket.

This may be controversial but I actually dislike a great many of the granny blankets that I see, and this is mainly to do with the use of colour. I appreciate that the reason they evolved was to use up left over wool and the thrift of this does appeal to me, but, sometimes these colours end up being a bit horrible. My top colour tips are to avoid black and white (unless you are only using black and white), and I personally think that anything sparkly, fluffy or variegated doesn’t belong in a blanket. However, I did also say that I would never make a blanket again or use acrylic! Hopefully Holly will treasure this blanket forever, when it is finally finished.