A fun finished object

Wanted to show off my latest FO! I made my friend Jaime a baby blanket for her future kid and the shower was yesterday. I've known Jaime since 5th grade, so it's very exciting that she's having her first baby. I wanted something simple and gender neutral (she's going to be surprised as to what she's having) along with something that was a touch nicer than normal and machine washable. This brought me to my first love... Rowan.

I went with Rowan Cashsoft DK for two reasons: one, I love the colors. It has that softness for baby gear, but it's not a "baby" yarn where it's scant with color. It's bright but not too bright. The second is that it's machine washable. I try to make baby gear like blankets machine washable so it's not a pain for the mom.

I found on Ravelry a free pattern from the fine people at Rowan for a block blanket with trees. I've always loved the motif of The Tree of Life, so this was an easy choice. I also liked how most of the pattern was pretty easy (for time's sake) but that there was some visual interest for the tree squares. It could be a quick project but not a boring project.

The pattern said to make it in just one color, but I wanted to use different colors to make it interesting and to match any colors that were in the baby's room. My first choice was the spring green, then went with cream, and finally picked a light blue to tie them all together.

What's great is that this blanket was knit continuously and didn't involve sewing... just changing colors for the blocks. I also managed to figure out a way so you couldn't see a color change on the front of the blanket for the tree blocks by starting the green color for those sections on the last row of the prior block. It made it look a lot cleaner, I felt.

I gave Jaime her blanket yesterday and she liked it a lot! It's exciting to think that in 6 weeks, a little baby will be wrapped up in my blanket. It's also surreal and bittersweet that this project is over, since it took awhile to finish up and it means that Jaime's pregnancy is winding down.

Here are some pics of the finished blanket the night before, along with Jaime posing with it, and then me and my friend Amanda posing with the blankets we each made for the shower. Amanda's, which I find cool, is made from a collection of yarn that her grandmother had and left to her when Amanda was in high school.

All in all, I'm very pleased with how it turned out. While knitting it, I kept imaging Jaime wrapping her kid up in it when it was a little chilly, and then him/her hugging it while napping as a toddler, and growing up with it. It has that classic look that I hope that's what happens.