I love knitting blankets because they’re the only project you can actually use as you’re working on them. As they grow, they’ll keep you nice and cozy while you stitch.
If you’ve been wondering how to knit a blanket and are hoping for a similarly cozy experience, this post will guide you through the steps to make any blanket from a baby blanket to a throw blanket and beyond, from any stitch pattern you’d like to use.
What You'll Need
– The type of yarn you want to use for your blanket – A pair of needles that are the right size for your yarn – Somewhere to soak your gauge swatch (a sink or a bowl of lukewarm water is fine) – A ruler – Some scratch paper to do some simple math – Maybe a calculator, if you’re like me
Many knitters like to work with acrylic yarn for blankets because they’re easy to launder. Others are fine with using a superwash merino wool and setting the blanket out to dry. Wool yarn will be somewhat warmer than acrylic yarn, but it often comes with a higher price tag. Choose a yarn with a couple plies and some structure to it. I like worsted weight yarn or, at the lightest, fingering-weight held double. I have also knit using bulky weight yarn. Bear in mind that, the thicker the yarn, the heavier the blanket, and that’ll be especially obvious on laundry day.
I know, I know, almost nobody likes swatching. The problem is, if you’re not working from a predesigned pattern, you really do need to do a swatch first. That’s because you won’t know how many stitches to cast on until you do your gauge swatch, and you don’t want to spend all this time hand knitting something as big as a blanket only to have it turn out the wrong size.
Step Two: Do Some Math
Once your gauge swatch is dried, you will be able to determine how many stitches you need to make the size blanket you want to make. Using a ruler, measure how many rows it takes to achieve 4 inches and how many stitches it takes. When you are done, you will divide each of those numbers by four. This will give you the number of stitches per inch and rows per inch.
Now, use that number of stitches per inch to figure out how many stitches you need to cast on and how many rows you need to knit. Once you know your target dimensions, multiply the stitches per inch and rows per inch with the width and length measurements of the blanket to figure out how many stitches and how many rows you will need for your completed blanket.
Once you know how many stitches you need to cast on and how many rows you need to knit, you can get to work. Be sure to choose a circular needle with a cable that is slightly shorter than your intended finished width. That will help keep you from having to deal with random bits of cable flapping around while you work. Then, it’s off to the races.