I'm lucky enough to now have an independent yarn shop close by called The Thrifty Thistle, 20 minutes walk away in fact! It's a double edge sword really.......close enough to buy yarn easily and well, close enough to buy yarn a bit too easily!!
Anyways I was in that happy place one morning and couldn't resist buying a ball of Stylecraft Merry Go Round in Pastel Rainbow. The trouble though with this type of variegated yarn is that it lures you in with its beautiful colours and then when you try and crochet it into something it can end up looking a bit too busy! It's designed with knitters rather than crocheters in mind really as the colour changes are short.
I pondered on what I could do with it and decided that breaking it up with a solid colour might be the best way to go with it. After some experimenting I decided to use moss stitch which is a lovely simple but very effective stitch. Just google moss stitch and I'm sure you'll find lots of references to it, it's also called linen or granite stitch.
I go up a hook size when I do moss stitch as it can crochet up tightly so if you want a nice drape and you have naturally tight tension like me then you might want to do the same. I used a 4.5mm for this blanket. Best to experiment though as tension does vary person to person.
I used two balls of stylecraft special dk in white, one ball of stylecraft merry go round in pastel rainbow and one ball of stylecraft special dk in pistachio. I made a small pram size baby blanket around 55x70cm and there was plenty of yarn left over.
I did 3 rows in white, then 1 row in pastel rainbow and this broke the colours up nicely
You could do all sorts of borders on this one! I considered using the rainbow yarn for the border but I thought it might then get too busy and take away from the stripes and I wanted the blanket to look quite crisp and modern. It needed to be gender neutral so I opted for a nice simple, crisp edging in pistachio. I did a round of half trebles, a round of double crochets, another round of half tebles and finished with crab stitch.
I've loved making this blanket and couldn't resist knitting a little hat to match! I can't wait to gift this set to my friend :)
If you decide to make a blanket just like mine then it's always lovely to get a mention for the inspiration. And if you're in the Felixstowe area make sure you pay a visit to The Thrifty Thistle......it's not just a yarny paradise, you'll find fabrics and haberdashery too!