Colour inspiration is everywhere, I'm always seeing colour inspiration and my phone is full of photos of random things just because I liked the colours! Sometimes it's right under our nose and whilst designing my latest cross stitch pattern 'Bloom Wildly' it occurred to me how well the thread colours I used could be applied to granny squares........I had a vision in my mind of a vintage style random granny square blanket so I set about matching the thread colours to yarn and came up with my Rosa combo - I chose 'Rosa' as I love roses and they are blooming in gardens everywhere at the moment!
I used 10 colours for my four round granny squares making 90 squares in total to achieve a 9 x 10 blanket. This gives a good lap blanket size and once the border was added it measured approx 100cm x 110cm
Here are the colours I used
Stylecraft Special DK
- Midnight
- Cornish Blue
- Teal
- Sage
- Duck egg
- Lime
- Mustard
- Fuchsia Purple
- Blush
- Soft Peach
- Hint of Silver (joining colour only)
I wanted the blanket to look as though the colour placement was random however I did plan the placement rather than adopt a 'lucky dip' approach so that I could make sure all the colours were used as equally as possible across the 90 squares. I do this by making 9 'round ones' from each of the 10 colours and for each subsequent rounds I share the squares out equally across the other colours to choose the next round. This way I mostly manage to get a nice equal dispersion of colours across the grannies.
Usually I have already chosen a joining colour at the start but I was in a real quandary with this one right up until I'd made all the squares. Once I'd made them all I'd narrowed the joining colour down to a couple of light, neutral shades, I didn't want anything dark for this one as there was already a few dark shades in the squares and I wanted the overall effect to be nice and light. I also don't join with any colour already used in the last round of the squares otherwise those squares get lost in the background and I personally don't like that look. I found laying all the squares out on the table in the planned placement helped me to finally decide on the joining colour!
I decided on Hint of Silver for joining which is a very light versatile grey and I use the continuous join as you go method to join squares wherever I can! It's quick and produces barely any ends, it really is worth learning this technique!
Once all my squares were joined I needed to decide on a border. I've kept it fairly simple with just a few rounds of granny stitch using hint of silver then granny stitch rounds using fuchsia purple and midnight and half trebles using teal and sage. With ten colours to choose from the border possibilities are endless! Anything goes really, and it has once again been a very enjoyable make! 
I received such a hugely supportive response to my recent Avril baby blanket pattern, thank you to everyone who bought the pattern and all who have messaged me to express their positive words about it, it has really helped my confidence with pattern writing and so I have once again put together a written pattern for this blanket so that if you would like to make one the same you can follow my exact colour placement and border. I know many of you love the idea of creating a granny square blanket with a vintage inspired random placement but feel overwhelmed by deciding on the actual randomness of it so I hope my pattern can help by doing that colour thinking bit for you!
The pattern is broken down into four parts......how I make a granny square, the Rosa colour placement, continuous join as you go method and finally the border and edging. It has lots of pictures and images to guide you through and there is a UK and US crochet terms version. It is suitable for a novice crocheter (NOT a complete beginner) ie someone who already knows the basics of crochet as stitch instructions are not detailed. Here is the link
Rosa Granny Square Lap Blanket Crochet PDF Pattern/tutorial - Etsy UK
You can also find video tutorials for making a granny square and continuous join as you go on my You Tube channel here
If you do decide to buy my pattern please can I ask that if you have any trouble downloading your files through Etsy or if you have any questions about the pattern or need more guidance that you contact me PRIOR to leaving a review to give me a chance to help you first. It's difficult to help or rectify an issue if I'm not aware there is one. Thank you. 
I hope you enjoy this colour combo......and to those of you who choose to buy my pattern thank you very much for your support and I look forward to seeing your Rosa creations on socials!
Faye :)