A spiral free form doll blanket

[sammimag]

I started this doll blanket (http://sammimagfiberstar.blogspot.com/2006/02/free-form-spiral-doll-blanket.html) last night. I like how the colors are working together and I'm not a pastel person. Anyway I think I increased too much in the spiral so it's not lying flat.

Any suggestions for me? Or is it on to the frogging?

[faithpa76]

Oh, I love that ... what a neat idea. No suggestions on the extra increases ... I'd probably frog, but maybe you can fudge it but getting it down to the "right" number of increases now - depends on how many too many there are, I guess. If I'm making any sense at all ... lol.

[Catana]

Whenever I'm working on something that requires increases, I lay it out flat every so often to see whether it's bunching up anywhere. That way, if I have to frog I don't have to go back too far.

[Lucy F]

I've just discovered free form crochet. I think it is so cool. I've never tried it but I would love to with all my scraps. I really like your blanket!

[sammimag]

I keep making this blanket and frogging it, then making it again and frogging it.

You can see more about the process in my blog post here. (http://sammimagfiberstar.blogspot.com/2006/05/its-all-about-process-rip-it-rip-it.html)

Thanks for looking.

[Catana]

I really liked that second go-round, with the waves. Sorry you decided to rip it out. Here's a hint about circular increases I've posted about before, with an addition. Normally, new stitches are at a right angle to the stitch they're going into. If your new stitch lies to the right (assuming you're a right-handed crocheter) it's time for an increase. The new stitch should be at a right angle to its base. If not, do one more increase. That will keep the work from starting to cup upwards.

Here's the new stuff. If you've done two or more increases and the last stitch is leaning toward the left, you've increased too much and the work will start waving. That's because your stitch in the next base stitch will want to push it over to the right.

If you keep an eye on this every few stitches, you can control cupping and waving, and actually work them in deliberately, for special effects.

I wish I was an artist and could draw all this, but I've tried to make it as clear as possible.

[Ladycrochat]

Really good tip Catana! Thank you for sharing it!:yay !

[Catana]

Hey Samantha, the photo of the blanket showed up in the Flickr section of my Freeform Crochet page today.

[sammimag]

Hey Samantha, the photo of the blanket showed up in the Flickr section of my Freeform Crochet page today.

I saw that too! My rainbow scrumbles were there too. That was fun to see that.

[Kiki]

I love that blanket! It is so original!