The Sky Blanket

by D Sharon Pruitt

And so after almost an entire year thinking about it, I've decided to knit a sky blanket.

I first heard about the sky blanket from Laura at Bugs and Fishes, who in turn was inspired by Lea Redmond's sky scarf.  Now it isn't that I'm not a fan of scarves because I am in a big way, it's just that I have an awful, awful lot of scarves and can't see myself being committed enough to finish a year long project that would end with something I have far too many of to begin with.  But I would love a blanket for Chloe's bedroom and the sky blanket idea really clicked and it's been niggling at me all year.

At first I thought "oh sky quilt, I could sew it" because I'd fallen out of love with knitting after making far too many of the really big daisies.

But since I've had my hands on some new yarn I'm back to enjoying it again having started with a few mindless and simple pattern repeats to get me going again.

I'm not exactly short of a blanket or six around here either.  I'm not sure if I ever mentioned it but my granny on my dad's side woke up one morning with what looked like a cold sore just underneath her nose, what quickly followed was an infection that somehow spread to her brain and caused complete memory loss.  You'll have to excuse the lack of details, I got the Chinese whispers version but the gist is that when she was finally discharged from hospital having regained some basic memories (who each of us were etc) she was a bit shocked to find there was no yarn nor tools to work it with in her home.  Somehow, and we've no idea how because she'd never done it before, she could crochet and not only that but she's a demon with a hook.  I don't know, maybe an old buried memory of being taught as a child or something surfaced but my house, all our houses are coming down with crocheted blankets.

I've never made it through a whole one myself though, often starting and rehashing them into smaller projects, but I will have a bash this year.  I have my diary at the ready and will make a note of what the sky looks like each day at noon and then knit the squares, I'll either be well behaved and do one every night or I won't and I'll be left rushing at the end of every week/month/year to catch up.  We shall see.  I should probably also make sure I always look out the same window when I'm at home, more than once this year it's been sunny at the front of the house and raining at the back but then that's Ireland for you, it ain't green because we paint it:)

Now I just have to choose the shades and buy the yarn ... it's a good thing I like grey.