GorlitsaKnits

The sock yarn blanket is coming along nicely.  I seem to be averaging two blocks per day.  Each one takes a little less than half an hour.  I don’t work on it every day, but one good long movie can put me ahead 3 or 4 days!

I am committed to using every bit of yarn I can, so I decided to keep the tiny balls of yarn that are too small to make a full block.  I use those to make a tiny block, four of which make up one large block.

The picture below shows all of the yarn I currently have for the blanket.  I have divided the yarns into those I expect can  still give me a full block, and those that are too small.  It’s guess work, but typically if a ball is the size of a golf ball, that’s enough for a full block.

Here is a close up of the smaller balls.  I need to pick four to make a full block.

I looked at the surrounding blocks and decided on these four yarns, to be arranged as shown.

I start with the bottommost block.  Since my large squares are 20 stitches to a side, I need to make the smaller ones 10 stitches to a side.  I count up from the bottom of space 10 stitches, then pick up those 10 stitches.  I pick up one stitch from the block below, like normal, then pick up 10 stitches up the side of the next block.  I should have 21 stitches on the needle.

I then work a garter block as normal, double decreasing at the center of every right side row.  In this case I actually ran out of yarn before the block was done, so I used my secondary technique of using up scraps — I just switched to a different yarn.  More on this in a later post.

I now need to make one of my second tier blocks.  I start by picking up ten stitches from along the side of the block just made.

The center stitch is now picked up.  This is the biggest difference from the full size blocks.  The center stitch is the tenth stitch on the large block to the left.  This stitch was already picked up once for the first small block.  Pick up this stitch again to be the center stitch for the second small block.

And then I pick up ten more stitches along the side of the large block.  I should end in the same place as I normally do, since I have picked up all 20 stitches along that block (10 for the first small block, 1 of those again for the center stitch of the second small block, and 10 more for the second small block.

I finish the block.

And repeat the process on the other side.

The final small block is worked just like the others.  This time the center stitch is picked up from the small block directly below.

These smaller sets do take a little more time than one large block, but they seem to go faster because you get the reward of finishing four times instead of one.  It’s a great way to use up the tiny scraps, and adds more complexity to the blanket.