Hello friends. As you know, we are still in the middle of a pandemic and there is not much else for a crafter to do besides craft. I’ve told myself that I was going to work through my stash during this time, although, it would be great if I wasn’t still adding it it.
I digress. So, I’ve had this cute yarn in my stash for months. I’ve bought it when I found out that a dear loved one was going to have a baby girl. this was also the time that I learned I was going to have another boy. By the way, I’m 1-3 now (3 boys and one girl).
The plan was to make my niece a blanket after I finished my son’s blanket. sadly, that didn’t happen. But what’s a good ol’ fashioned lockdown for? I decided to whip that cute yarn out and just have a go!
The yarn is Lionbrand Ice Cream — Banana Split. I really can’t say why I like it so much. It could be that it screams spring. Or, it has to do with the purple—not sure.
I have worked with this type of yarn before and I remember that it does have long stripes. I really wanted to keep that. However, I didn’t want a dense project. In order to do that I knew it had to be a short stitch (something with single crochet).
Looking through Instagram and Pinterest, there was a stitch I haven’t used yet—Moss stitch. It also goes by granite stitch and linen stitch. It has a few names. But this was the perfect stitch for this project.
I really like how the stripes cane out, and the colors just seem to play nicely with each other. It doesn’t matter that the colors switched colors in the middle of the rows. The way this is worked up (single crochet in the chain space), everything just went well together.
I ended up using 2 1/2 balls of this yarn—which makes sense to me. If you were to use a Big Scoop by Lionbrand then you would only need 1 ball.
This project did take me some time. That is mainly because I only knit or crochet during my baby’s nap time. I’m not complaining since it’s built in craft time. I would like to think that it’s because of all of the single crochet—but I also knit and not afraid of a slow growing project.
Finally, I was looking and trying to think of a border for this blanket. Let me just say it now, there are tons of cute borders. I just needed a border that suits the project and the person who it was for. A simple single crochet was too plain and I just didn’t want to do the same moss stitch as the border.
The humble picot stitch to the rescue! I’ve seen this stitch in knitting as a finishing but I never had a need to use it. So this is the first time that I did and I am impressed. This maybe something I’ll use more often.
Overall, this was a nice project to get my mind off of the current events and keep my hands busy. I’m also working on another crochet project and I look forward to sharing that with you as well.
How to Crochet the Moss Stitch
Like I said before, this pattern goes by many names, and another common name is Woven Stitch.
• Chain Stitch any even number of multiples.
• Step 1: 1sc in 2nd Chain from the hook.
• Step 2; (row 1 count), * Ch1, skip 1ch, 1sc in next ch; repeat from * to end, turn.
• Step 3: (row 2) Ch1, skip first sc, *1sc in ch-1 sp, ch1, skip 1sc; rep from * to end of row, 1sc in ch-1, turn.
Step 4: Repeat step 3.
In the meantime—stay crafting ❤️.