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| Before blocking |
You may be surprised to learn that in 18 years of crocheting I have yet to give blocking a go. I've heard good things about the results you get from it so always thought that it may be worth a try. However until now I had always ended up avoiding doing it as it seemed to be far too much like hard work. Now I'm at the stage where I would like my crochet to look a little more professional so I've been doing a bit of background reading on the subject and have been looking for a suitable project to try it out on.
Well after deciding it was high time I gave it a go I started working on some "
branching leaves" scarves which were turning out quite wrinkly and so I thought that these would really benefit from a good blocking out and steaming. I finished working up these scarves quite some time ago and then hid them in my crochet work bag while I put off spending the time to laboriously pin them both out on my bedroom floor.
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| Go steam iron! |
After two months of feeling a little guilty about them I pulled them out and went at them with a pile of pins. After a good few pins and some very sore fingers I had them all arranged nicely and looking a lot flatter. As I wasn't too sure just how taunt I should pull the stitches on these scarves I just settled for trying to get them straight with the leaves lying mostly flat. Then I turned my steam iron on full and blasted away at them with the steam which turned my bedroom into a bit of a sauna but seemed to be doing the trick.
Then I closed the bedroom door and ignored them for a good few hours while I enjoyed a well earned cup of tea.
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| All pinned out |
After roughly 7 hours I went back to release my scarves from all those pins. It was a little bit of a let down seeing that they looked just how I had left them (I'm not too sure what I was expecting to happen behind my closed bedroom door) but after taking all the pins out they did keep their flatter shape and looked much straighter and neater than they did before.
Though I'm happy with the result that I got with my first blocking experiment I'm still not convinced the end result was worth all that effort. Oh well - at least that's two more presents to add to the Christmas box.
5 comments:
I find blocking a bit of a mystery, too. Some people spray with water, some people steam, some even iron! I have only tried it out a couple of times - I also don't want to bother with it most of the time. Let me know if you find a method that works well - as I'm trying to find one, too!
P.S. Your scarves are beautiful!
BHi your branching leaves scarf is beautiful, I too am very much interested in making this scarf however, I am having a hard time with the charting and reading it. Would you happen to have a written pattern for this scarf? As far as the blocking goes I have found that using the pinned method works well so long as your garment is somewhat wet after soaking for a bit in water I squeeze out the excess water and then lay it out on a towel and pin pin pin this has worked well for me...plz answer with tips on how to read this pattern...Thanks, Joanne in SC
Hi Joanne, glad you liked my post on the branching leaves scarf. I don't have a written pattern as I just followed the chart to make my scarves. Try the Craft Yarn Council for help on reading crochet charts (http://www.craftyarncouncil.com/files/CYCACrochetChartSymbols.pdf)
Hello, your scarf is lovely! I have been trying to locate this pattern. Do you happen to have a copy of the chart? I followed your link but cannot find the pattern. I'd appreciate any help! my email is princessgracedesigns @ hotmail.com
Hello Beverly, I've had a quick look online to try to find the chart for this scarf and it has unfortunately been taken off the website since I made it.
Looks like the original poster on Craftster didn't have copyright permission to post the chart so it got removed.
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