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In this tutorial, I'm going to walk you through the trickier parts of this blanket.
It's called the Ten Stitch blanket, and it's by Frankie, who is Rosemily on Ravelry.
This is a free pattern, and if you'd like to get your pattern to follow along, I'll
give you a link on screen as well as in the video description below.
Now, I've had so many requests for this as a tutorial, and it just happens to lend itself
really well for a video tutorial.
Because the most difficult part of this whole blanket is right at the beginning.
If I can walk you through the trickier parts of this, the rest of the blanket will be a
breeze.
I want to talk a little about Frankie, the designer of this.
She has dozens of patterns out, and they're all free. All available on Ravelry.
And she doesn't charge for any of the, instead, she asks if you like her patterns, that you
make a donation to the Children's Liver Foundation.
So it was really nice. I really enjoyed working with Frankie on this tutorial, and meeting
her, and hearing her story.
So, if you like this pattern, couple things. You can make a donation to the Children's
Liver Foundation, and she gives you all the links for that.
And you can also check out some of her other patterns that evolved from this design.
And I want to get the names right, here are a few of them.
The Ten Stitch Twist, Ten Stitch Triangle, Double Ten Stitch, Ten Stitch Zigzag, Ten
Stitch Wave.
And those are the ones that she just had off the top of her head.
They all use the same techniques. So once you've made this one, you enjoy it, you can
try some of her other ones, they're all well written patterns and nice deisgns.
Um, as far as yarn and needles for this goes, you can use any yarn, any needles, any gauge,
and this pattern's going to work.
Really the rule of thumb is, if you like the fabric you're creating, you're good.
Go with it.
Now a couple of different ways of thinking about how you want to work this.
You can either think of the yarn you want to use, or fall in love with a yarn, and then
start knitting it up.
And if you're wondering what needle size to use with any given yarn, a good place to start
is by looking on the yarn label, the yarn ball band.
And they'll give you a suggested needle size there.
Start with that, if you decide you want tighter gauge or looser gauge, you can adjust your
needle size from there.
No problem. Just get what you like.
The other thing you can do -- we have a huge benefit to this pattern.
This pattern has been out for a while, and thousands of people have already knit it,
and posted their results on Ravelry.
So you can go to the Ravelry page for this pattern, I'll give you a link to all this,
and take a look at the photos other people have posted.
You can benefit from what they've already figured out.
You can either find a picture you like, what someone else has done, take a look at the
yarn they used, the gauge they had, the size of blanket that they knit, etc.
And use their information as a guideline.
Because you're gauge is a little different from theirs, your results might vary, but
it's a good place to start.
And if you end up with a little bit of extra yarn, it's not a problem, you can always make
a hat out of it or something.
Now, I'll also give you the details to how this blanket worked out, but you all seem
to appreciate it when I tell you my knucklehead knitting stories, because I definitely have
one for this blanket!
Um, you see how I did this.
I start out with the lightest color in the center, and it gradually goes out to darker
colors.
And that was my idea. That was my vision for this blanket.
And I was teaching a class at my favorite local yarn store, Gauge Knits, here in Austin
Texas.
And I knew I was going to buy yarn for this pattern after my class was over.
So I had my colors picked out, but apparently I had used all of my brain power teaching
the class, because when I went to buy the yarn, I bought three hanks of each color.
Those of you who are thinking ahead already see the knucklehead move here.
If you want to do a blanket that has -- that fades out like this one does, you're going
to need far less yarn for the center, than for the outside bands.
That makes a lot of sense now, but it didn't even occur to me at the time, buying three
hanks of each.
So, just kind of going with it, and not really wanting to return the yarn, I did, this is
a baby blanket size, I did the cream color border on the outside.
And it turns out that people I've shown the blanket to say that they like it better that
way, I'm fine with it, I think it looks good.
Being flexible with the colors definitely worked to my advantage here.
Not having to drive back to the yarn store.
Okay, if you get your free pattern, yarn, needles, we're going to start out right with
the beginning of this blanket, and walk through the whole first section of it.
And we're going to start that, in the next section.
Okay, we're ready to get started with this blanket, and I'm going to walk you through
the entire first section, which is where people start and end up giving up, because the hardest
part is right at the beginning.
Let's go ahead and take a look.
I want to show you how this is put together, and the construction of this.
This is actually the cast on right here.
And you're going to work ridges, then a mitered corner, a mitered corner, more ridges, mitered
corner, ridges, mitered corner, and we connect it to itself as we go around.
There are never more than ten stitches at a time, on the needles, for this blanket.
Which is why I ended up knitting mine entirely on double pointed needles.
You can use circulars or straights, I like to use the shortest needles possible, which
is why I stuck to double pointed needles.
There is a little bit of risk of stitches sliding off one of the two ends, but I didn't
have a problem with it.
But if they do slide off, it's only ten stitches to pick up.
So this is the front.
The front of the blanket really shows what I call the bones of the blanket.
The back of the blanket, you can see, still very pretty.
But you don't get the ridges.
Yeah, you get a ridge, they're both pretty.
Both sides seem like the right side on this.
Okay.
So if you take a look at the pattern, it says cast on ten stitches, and slipping all first
stitches, knit nine ridges.
And that's exactly what I've done here.
I've got a snag in my work.
Exactly what I've done here.
I'm going to encourage you throughout this pattern -- don't count rows.
Count ridges.
You see these ridges here? All in garter stitch.
These are garter stitch ridges, and they're made by knitting two rows, down and back,
that gives you one ridge.
So give your row counter a rest, take it easy, use just the easy way of counting ridges throughout
instead of counting rows.
I will tell you that if you want to count rows on this first little section, that is
fine.
The pattern tells you to knit nine ridges, or 18 rows.
But keep this in mind, your cast on will create half of a ridge.
So it's actually casting on and knitting 17 rows.
Once you get that you're here and you're ready to go.
This is the easiest part, I'm not going to demonstrate this part.
Slip the first stitches, knit 9 ridges.
Let's take a look at the pattern really quickly, because there is something I don't' want you
to miss.
And it is, yeah, the second page, near the end of the pattern.
She gives you row by row instructions for the mitered corners.
Okay.
So this is what you want to follow if you are keeping count of your rows, which I encourage
for the mitered corners only.
Because it is 18 rows and then 16 rows, and that's what I'm going to show you how to do
right now.
On this little piece we're going to work a mitered corner to get us here, and then a
mitered corner to get us here.
This is the only part of the blanket where we're going to work two mitered corners, in
a row.
So Row 1.
I'm going to slip 1.
And that means I'm going to slide it from the left needle to the right without working
it.
And you always want to slip purl-wise, unless the pattern tells you otherwise.
So I'm going to slip 1, knit 8.
And then I'm going to do a wrap and turn.
But don't worry, because I'm not going to be picking up these wraps!
I know people don't mind working short rows, but they don't like picking up the wraps.
This blanket you don't have to.
You're going to yarn forward, slip that last stitch purlwise, and then it says yarn back,
and turn.
Okay.
Now we're going to work the wrong side row here.
Slip 1 purlwise, then put the yarn back between the two needles.
This is all spelled out in the pattern.
And knit 9, which is to the end of the row.
And I want to keep track of which row, I'm going to flip my page.
Okay.
So now I have one stitch unworked, I'm going to have two stitches unworked here, to help
turn the corner.
If you've never done a mitered corner before, just follow the instructions closely for the
first part, and then you'll start to get what's happening, and you won't need the pattern
anymore.
I just slipped one, I'm going to knit 7 this time.
And then I'm going to do another wrap and turn, not finishing up the end of this row.
So pull the yarn forward between the two needles, slip one stitch, yarn back, and turn the work.
Then Row 4, I slip that stitch back, and you see I've given myself a little wrap around
this stitch.
Then I yarn back, and I'm going to knit 8.
So you see what's happening here.
On Row 1 I knit 8, on Row 3, I knit 7, on Row 5, I'm going to knit 6.
We're going to count down, all the way to 1.
Slip 1, knit 6.
Yarn forward, slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, turn the work.
Then Row 6, which is the wrong side of the work, slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, knit 7.
I'm knitting with these giant needles. I wouldn't have chosen this to make a blanket this chunky,
myself.
They really slow the knitting down for me.
Row 7, slip 1, knit 5.
Yarn forward, slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, turn the work.
Slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, knit 6.
Row 9, slip 1, knit 4.
Yarn forward, slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, turn work.
Slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, knit 5.
Okay, we're almost there.
Slip 1 knit 3, on Row 11.
Yarn forward, slip 1 purlwise, yarn back, turn the work.
Slip 1 purlwise, yarn back.
This is all written out in the pattern, exactly the order to do things, but once you start
to get a feel for what a wrapped stitch looks like, it is easier.
You don't have to think about each step.
Slip 1, and knit 2.
I actually lost count, and I went and looked.
And I saw that I had a wrap on this one, and not a wrap on this one, so I knew this was
my next one.
Row 15.
Slip 1, knit 1.
And wrap the third stitch.
Yarn back and knit 2.
The rows are very short right now.
Row 16. Slip 1, knit 1.
Oops, no.
I did that incorrectly. It was slip 1 and wrap the second stitch.
I just slip 1, no knitting, wrapping the next stitch.
Okay.
So, Row 17 is the last row.
Look at how cool this is. I love knitting in shapes.
We're actually not going to slip 1 on Row 17.
We just knit that first one and wrap the next stitch.
It looks like I already did that one!
Did I?
Could be an optical illusion.
Okay.
That is the first half of the mitered corner.
And now we're going to work the second half to get us into a square and ready to start
the other direction.
And so Row 1, we reverse the process on this, starting over with Row 1.
We slip 1, we knit one, and you're going to put another wrap on this stitch.
So it's exactly like we were doing before, except we're going to add a stitch each time.
And then Row 3, slip 1 knit 2.
Row 4, or Row 5, slip 1 knit 3.
And you're going to start increasing that number every time.
So that all the stitches are once again live and active on the needle.
And nicely, Frankie has written this out row by row for us.
So the first time you work it, first couple times you work it, you might want to do, use
your row counter and make sure you're keeping count.
If you're used to what wraps look like, you won't have to keep count, because it's pretty
easy to see the wraps, if you know what you're looking for.
That's why I use this big bulky yarn.
Okay.
I'm not going to go through all of these rows.
If you follow it row by row.
And you see, I've already turned a corner here.
Finish that corner, and then work a second corner, and then we'll be ready to start on
the flat sides of this blanket, which is really the bulk of this blanket.
You've got the hardest part of the blanket behind you, the first two mitered corners,
now you're ready to start the flat side.
The first flat side of the blanket, which at the beginning of the blanket is still pretty
short.
Let's go ahead and take a look.
Here are my mitered corners here.
And here is the flat side that I'm going to start now.
What's going to happen is I'm going to work across, and pick up a stitch, and decrease,
and work back, and that's going to attach it as I move along.
With never more than ten stitches on the needle.
Now let's talk about attaching.
This is where, working the flat side, we're going to count ridges, not rows.
We worked 18 rows here for 9 ridges at the very beginning, from the cast on.
We want to pick up 9 rows along here.
This is what I do.
I count.
And this time I only have 9 to pick up, because this is a very short side.
But these little bumps in the fabric right here is where I know I want to pick up.
And those slipped stitches really help with seeing that.
This is going to be the last one, we'll count down from that.
9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, and I'm going to pick up one in the very very corner.
I very carefully count every time, if you are a more relaxed person, you might just
go with it and not worry about it.
[laughs]
I'm a counter, and I'm actually going to show you here in a moment -- is it this section?
Let me check if I show you in this section.
Yes, I'm going to show you in the next section how I use markers to make sure I'm always
staying on 9 rows.
But I want to show you here how to do the technique.
I'm going to pick up 9 rows here.
So I slip the first stitch, and knit across.
8 stitches.
I'm going to slip the last stitch.
Okay, this is where I'm going to connect it to the work.
I'm going to pick up and knit a stitch right here in the very very corner.
This is different from how the other ones are going to go.
So I put my needle in, wrap it and pull it through, and suddenly I have 11 stitches,
which is too many.
So I'm going to pass that last slipped stitch over the stitch I just picked up.
Like binding one stitch off.
Now I'm going to turn the work, and work back.
And this -- we're going to pause this here because I want to show you something.
You have two options for how you want to pick up the stitches.
This one is a modified version of what's in the pattern, and it's what I used in my big
blanket.
It's a chain pick up.
And this leaves you with a row of Vs all the way around the bones of the blanket.
And this one's not going to be as easy to see.
This is a little sample that I knit up, using leftover bits of yarn at home, when I was
breaking down the pattern to really be able to explain it well.
This is what the connecting stitch in the pattern looks like.
It looks like twill.
It looks like a long tail cast on, or something.
Just these, one half of the V, in a pattern like that.
So it's up to you how you want to do it.
I found that I prefer the chain pick up.
And the way that you, um, which every one that you decide, the way that makes the difference,
the thing that makes the difference, is this first stitch on the second row of that ridge.
And to work the chain pick up, I'm going to slip that stitch, and knit the other 9.
To work the regular pick up, I just knit all ten.
I'm going to show you again here.
Okay, so I just completed the first of the 9 pick ups that I want to do here.
And this is something that I do. I put a marker in that first one.
That first ridge, that I just made.
So I know that's 1.
If I put my work down and come back to it, I know that I have 8 more to do.
Slip 1 and knit 8 again.
Then to do the connecting stitch, I slip 1, I go over here and I'm going to pick up, this
is a normal pick up, I'm going to pick up in this loop right here.
Stab it in there. You can really stab it in anywhere you want, as long as you're consistent.
I like to stab it in right in the middle of that loop.
Of that bump at the end.
I pick that one up.
I pass the slipped stitch over the one I just picked up.
And then to do the chain connecting stitch, I slip the first stitch, yarn back, and knit
all the rest.
Okay.
We can start to see the connecting stitch coming out here.
And, I can tell I've knit 1, 2 ridges of the nine that I need to do.
You'll continue that all the way to the end, work another mitered corner, and then the
next one that you have to do, then next pickup that you have to do, are from the cast on
row.
Which are really no different, you're just going to be picking up both legs of the V,
as you work across and pick up the stitches.
Rather than poking into one of the garter stitch ridges.
Then you'll work another mitered corner, and this is where it starts to get interesting,
because the sides are longer.
And that's what we're going to talk about next.
Placing markers to keep really careful count as you move along.
Okay, you've made it through the trickiest parts of the blankets.
I just want to show you how I use stitch markers to keep really careful count of what I'm doing.
And before I go any further, you don't have to keep the careful count that I keep.
I like doing that.
And if you're just more relaxed about your blanket and everything, that's fine, it's
going to work out fine.
In fact, with all of the counting and marking that I did, the whole blanket that I knit,
I would have only two stitches.
Everything turned out to be perfectly on track every time when I counted it, and it was only
two stitches, two times in the blanket that I had to squeeze in an extra stitch.
Because the count wasn't perfect.
But I'm going to show you how to do it, maybe you'll like it.
It's kind of like a crossword puzzle or something for me.
Let's take a look.
Here is a blanket with a little bit more done, as you can see.
Umm, here are my first two corners, the first edge, another corner, picking up from the
cast on edge, another corner.
And this starts to get longer.
And that's what most of this blanket is going to be.
These long knitted sides.
And the corners will be fewer and farther between.
So I'm ready to start this side.
And this side I have, it's always a multiple of 9 that I have to pick up.
And I can see here that I have 9 once and 9 twice to pick up.
I've already counted 9 ridges and placed a marker -- well, I went this way.
I counted 9 ridges, and placed a marker.
Then counted 9 ridges and as it gets longer, I'll be placing more markers to mark each
section of 9.
And after I work the first ridge and back, like I showed you in the last video, I always
put a clippie marker to mark the first ridge.
Then as I finish up 9, I put a clippie marker in the next section.
So I always know right where I am.
It's not totally necessary, but it does make it easier if I am unsure about the count,
the most I ever have to count back is 9.
And as you get further into the blanket, it's kind of a bigger deal, because you end up
with dozens of stitches to pick up, and you don't want to have to count back through all
of those each time.
So that's how I do it.
The markers here, that I'm picking up, and keeping track of how many that I've already
picked up, with clippie markers.
And I'll give you a link to where you can find clippie markers like this.
You can also use safety pins or scraps of yarn, but these are easier to take out than
scraps of yarn.
Okay, another thing I want to show you is changing color.
And I will give you, in the video description and on my website.
I will give you specific instructions for how to work the rows when you're changing
color.
I just want to show you that you have options for how you want to do this.
I wanted to work this blanket square.
So I worked, there's my center square, there's my next square.
I worked three strips all the way around to make a perfect square, and then I changed
color.
If you want to make this blanket a rectangle, you can actually take the color around one
more wrap, and then change color here, and that will give you a rectangle shape to work
from.
It's really up to you.
I just want to show you that is how I changed colors.
At the square.
Does that make sense? Yes.
The specific instructions for how I worked the rows so that the right side of the work
stays nice will be in the video description below, and on my website.
And next up, I'm going to show you the finishing work that I like to do when I'm working a
machine washable and dryable blanket.
I'm going to show you how to super secure your blanket, so it can be machine washed
and dried, if that's the kind of yarn that you chose to use.
The one that I knit is a wool and synthetic blend which is machine washable, so this is
what I did.
The thing -- I always tie knots and do this method, I've shown this in videos before.
Because I would just be mortified, if I gave someone a baby gift, and they washed it, and
it started falling apart.
So this is my super secure way of tying off the ends so nothing can come unraveled.
Let's go ahead and take a look.
I'm going to show you on this sample, which clearly isn't finished yet, but I can demonstrate.
And I have my tapestry needle right here.
I thought I was funny, by doing that.
I'm going to poke this end through to the back, because I'm going to consider this the
front of the work.
So to get started I'm going to poke that through to the back, and weave it in back here.
And if you're using a wool yarn that's going to be sticky and stick to itself, and not
be machine washed, you can just do a regular weaving in in garter stitch.
I'll give you a link to the video I have on that right here.
This is the super secure way.
I'm going to just weave this in, just a couple of stitches. It's not even anything fancy.
And then, this is where the fancy trick comes in.
I'm going to untwist the plies, half and half.
And this is actually a wool yarn, that is clearly sticky!
And doesn't need to be woven in like this.
If I wanted it to be really secure, I could.
This is a two ply yarn, I've separated the plies, two and two.
I'm going to thread half of those plies on the tapestry needle.
And then just take that half a stitch away.
So that the two ends are coming out of places right next to each other.
Then tie a double knot with those two ends.
And really pull it tightly.
Don't break the yarn, just shy of breaking the yarn really.
So that's really secure.
And I can cut it really short.
And it can go in the washing machine, and it's almost invisible.
That's it, the Ten Stitch Blanket.
Many thanks to Frankie for letting us use her pattern in this tutorial.
Good luck!
[whooshing sounds]
[music]