Dance Line-up...

Putting all 48 squares together last week I don't know if I was more overwhelmed or underwhelmed.  Laid out (even without a border) I could tell that forty-eight 9-inch squares was going to make a huge blanket.  While I've seen pictures of this blanket made large enough to cover a queen sized bed, it wasn't until I saw all those squares laid out in person that I knew I didn't want a blanket that large.

And then there were so many gray squares!   Why did I think 3 shades of gray (4, if you count graphite as gray - but it sort of looks brown, too) would look good in one blanket?  And then add the light blue...   well, it just completely underwhelmed me.

I had it on the floor for a few hours - trying out different arrangements, even adding some bolder yarn to the mix - wondering if I should make even more (brighter) squares...

~~~~~

And then I decided to just pull most of the gray squares out.  That definitely improved things.  Both visually, and I liked the size better.   But turning my 48-square blanket into a 35-square blanket filled me with regret at all the time (and yarn) spent making those now unnecessary squares.

And then I got an idea.   I stacked all the light blue and several shades of gray squares together.

Huh.   Those don't look bad together!   Maybe add some squares in a darker blue (a medium blue) and white?  Maybe?   As is, I've easily got enough squares already to make a baby blanket.  Add a few accent squares of darker blue and white (? - not sure why the white makes me hesitate), - and I've got enough squares for a child-size blanket!   Yay!  Two blankets out of this Last Dance CAL!  I'm not going to jump into making the second blanket just yet, but I'm saving the squares above 'till I figure out what to add to them.  Maybe add some soft lime green?   I dunno.

I'm open to suggestions.

Anyway...  Happy enough that I had come up with a plan for all the squares above, I started joining these:

It's slow going, but after several mistakes I finally got all but one vertical seam finished.

Since I can't get a decent color picture today, I'll just give you four seamed squares in black & white. 


And then it's on to the horizontal seams. The good thing is the horizontal seams are shorter than the vertical seams so they should finish up quicker.  The bad thing is there are more horizontal seams than vertical seams so they may take longer.  Another good thing is now that I know what I'm doing and since I don't have to fiddle so much with the squares, the horizontal seaming might still go quicker.

The plan is to get this thing finished by next Sunday.  Seamed, blocked if necessary, border finished.

I think I can do it.  What do you think?

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2018 Yarn Stash-Down:  11.26/100 Skeins