after 1,000,000 trys...

This is a really long story... do not feel obligated to read this. I just want to remember this, so I'm documenting it. All you need to know is that the past six weeks I have been spending most of my days fretting and working on a baby blanket, starting over several times, and spending countless hours looking at patterns and making Jarrod go look at yarn with me.

Once I found out we were having a boy, I started thinking about making him a baby blanket. I went to Joannes to look at some yarn options. I was very disappointed in their selection... I kept walking down the same two aisles over and over thinking about what color to do the blanket in. They didn't have anything I liked, so I moved on to the Michael's down the street.

They had a way better selection, which actually made the situation worse. What color to do the blanket? Did I want to have just one color, or do a pattern? I sat on the floor of the store looking through magazines with patterns getting more and more overwhelmed and confused. This is a baby blanket that I am making for my first born with my bare hands... IT HAS TO BE PERFECT!

I called my favorite guy in the whole world, and he came up to the store to rescue me from my anxiety attack from the yarn and pattern possibilities.

I blabbed on about all the different possible options, and we walked out of the store with a deep turquoise soft yarn, and a sage green that was on sale to practice different stitches with.

I spent about three hours looking online and practicing different stitch patterns, and finally decided to go with a nice basic shell pattern. After looking up several versions of the shell pattern, and trying out the different variations, I went with this one:

The more I thought about the color, the more I didn't think it was the best idea. There was almost zero chance of it matching the yet to be determined nursery decor... and with super soft baby blankets they make, I figured I wouldn't be wrapping him up in the blanket much. I didn't see the point in this blanket, so back to the drawing board I went.

I spent COUNTLESS hours looking up different patterns online, and practicing different stitches until I finally decided to do this cute little solid blanket that had a weaved edge. Perfect, I thought. I would do the blanket in a basic white, and then when we decide the nursery color, I can make the weaved edge in that color. Brilliant, I was so happy. Jarrod went with me to the store to purchase the white yarn, him determining which one was the softest and most suitable for our son.

I started working on this blanket, and was very pleased. Then I started to realize that my rows were getting longer and longer, making what was supposed to be a square blanket into more of a trapezoid. I got over halfway done with that one and started all the way over:

I decided to go with a different stitch pattern so that I wouldn't have trouble with the trapezoid affect (effect?). As I was working on what was now my third attempt, I realized that while this one wasn't turning into a trapezoid, it still wasn't perfectly straight. I kept going though, knowing I was going to put an edge on the blanket, and hopefully that would cover up any imperfections along the sides.

I finished the body of the blanket, which I was NOT thrilled with, and went on to the edge. Now, keep in mind it has been weeks since I first went to the store, so poor Jarrod has had to put up with me asking him about different patterns, watching me start something and shortly ripping it all out and starting again. What a good husband I have, patiently listening, and even contributing ideas and shopping with me for more yarn. He would come home from a day of teaching and see me in the floor with five different stitch patterns going, and balls of yarn strewn about everywhere.

Anyway... when I was working on the edge of this blanket, I really just hated it. It looked too girly:

So, I was not pleased. The edge was too frilly and girly, and I also thought the white was pretty girly. I again looked up baby blankets and watched youtube videos on different stitch options, and found one that I really thought might work. I practiced it with my green yarn, realized I could do a straight edge with this pattern and decided I would try one more time. I waited until Jarrod got home, and presented him with the idea of starting over... and with a new color. He graciously took me to the store, and we were back to talking about color options again (poor Jarrod). I decided to go with just your basic baby blue. I started the pattern, and it was working out perfectly. I was so happy with it. After I got the first chunk done I started wondering if I should put stripes in the blanket. I used my powerpoint skills to create several different options, and looked at them with Jarrod and decided to put a stripe in the blanket. We headed up to the yarn store again for the 97th time and picked up the new color.

I'm done with this blanket, it has transformed from what I started making several times, but I'm finally done and I love the final product.

Here is a very small sampling of the stitch patterns that I tried, just to illustrate how obsessive and ridiculous I have been about this

And here is the final product. I am very happy with this blanket. (by the way, for those of you who don't know, I haven't been working the past few months waiting on a broker change... so this is why I had SO much time to devote to my crazy blanket fiasco.)

Jarrod - I know that you could not care any less about the color of the blanket, or the pattern, or the edge, or the size... but you paid attention, you watched, you took pictures, you went with me to the store, you gave your opinions, and always told me how good whatever version I was working on looked. I appreciate you seeing how important this was to me and being a part of it.