Moss Diamond Blanket

Vicke left the following comment the other day. 

I love this design! Even though I have never knitted, I would like to make this into a 5' x 6' blanket. As a beginner do you have any suggestions for me and can you please tell me how much/kind yarn I would need to create a soft durable blanket. Thank you very much for sharing. Vicke

Vicke, I’m glad you asked! 

Before beginning a project such as this, I always have a plan.  The first part of that plan includes what yarn I am going to use.  I can’t stress enough how important yarn choice is.  You see, certain stitches just look better on some yarns than others.  Take cables for example.  They look fantastic in a nice wool or wool blend yarn as the yarn is able to have some give to it and will fill out in the blocking process.  However in a linen yarn, they look awful.  Linen just does not have the “give” or “springiness” that wool does resulting in cables that look forced rather than an elegant cross over of stitches.  With that said, this pattern is a combination of knit and purl stitches and these stitches look fantastic in just about anything.  I’m only asking if we can refrain from using acrylic.  Please use the good stuff.  If you are gonna take the time and effort to knit something lets at least know we will enjoy the feel of it when its all put together.

Vicky mentioned that she has never knitted but wants to start.  Most new knitters are more successful with a bulky yarn that knits up at 12-14 stitches per 4 inch.  A good yarn choice would be Elann.com PeruvianHighland Bulky. I LOVE this yarn and am very excited it comes in a bulky weight. 

Now that we have our yarn picked out lets work on the pattern.  We know the finished dimensions are to be 5’ by 6’ which converts to 60” x 72”.  We also know that we should get 12-14 sts per 4 inch which equals 3 -3.5 sts per inch with our yarn choice.   In order to calculate how many stitches needed to cast on we multiply our total length in inches by the number of stitches we get per inch.

60 inches in length x 3 sts per inch = 180 sts to cast on.

All blankets look more finished when it has at a least one inch border.   I’m going with a seed stitch border because this will compliment the seed stitch found in the pattern.  A seed stitch is simply a knit one stitch followed by purling one stitch.   This is a repeat of 2 stiches. Remember we want a one inch border and in our yarn 3 stitches is equal to one inch.  If we designate 4 stitches for the left and 4 stitches for the right side of the border, our border will be a little bit more than one inch on each side.

We calculated that we needed 180 stitches total for the blanket and 8 stitches for our border leaving 172 stitches left over for the center.

180 total stitches – 8 border stitches = 172 stitches left over for the center pattern.

Now for the center pattern.  It is a multiple of 12 stitches.  So to figure out how many repeats of this pattern we will need, we just divide our center stitches by the pattern repeat.

172 pattern stitches / 12 = 14.33333

Well in knitting there is no such thing as .333333.  You either have a stitch or you don’t.  No left overs are allowed which means we need to find the answer that will give us a whole number.

An easy way to do this is to take our number of stitches per repeat and multiply that by the whole number of repeats just calculated.

12 stitches per inch x 14 repeats = 168 center pattern stitches. 

Because we adjusted the center pattern stitches to be 168, we need to add on the 8 border stitches to come up with 176 stitches to cast on. 

Moss Diamond Blanket

Materials:
Yarn = Elann.com PeruvianHighland Bulky
Needles = US10


With US 10 cast on 176 sts .

Row 1: *k1, p1; rep from *

Row 2: *p1, k1; rep from *

Row 3: *k1, p1; rep from *

Row 4: *p1, k1; rep from *

Row 5: (k1, p1) twice, follow row 1 of Moss Diamond Pattern to the last 4 stitches, (k1, p1) twice.

Row 6: (p1,k1) twice, follow row 2 of Diamond Pattern to the last 4 stitches, (p1, k1) twice.

Continue repeating rows 5 and 6 substituting in the appropriate row of the moss diamond pattern until you have 5 ½ feet in length. 

Repeat rows 1-4 and then bind off. 

NOTE: The Moss Diamond Pattern will be repeated 14 times

Moss Diamond and Lozenge Pattern
A Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns, pg 17

Multiple of 12 sts.

Rows 1 and 2: *K6, p6; rep from *
Rows 3 and 4: * P1, k5, p5, k1; rep from *
Rows 5 and 6: *K1, p1, k4, p4, k1, p1; rep from *
Rows 7 and 8: *P1, k1, p1, k3, p3, k1, p1, k1; rep from *
Rows 9 and 10: *(k1, p1) twice, k2, p2, (k1, p1) twice; rep from *
Rows 11 and 12: *P1, k1; rep from *
Rows 13 and 14: *K1, P1; rep from *
Rows 15 and 16: *(P1, k1) twice, p2, k2, (p1, k1) twice; rep from *
Rows 17 and 18: *K1, p1, k1, p3, k3, p1, k1, p1; rep from *
Rows 19 and 20: *P1, k1, p4, k4, p1, k1; rep from *
Rows 21 and 22: *K1, p5, k5, p1; rep from *
Rows 23 and 24: *P6, k6; rep from *
Rows 25 and 26: *P5, k1, p1, k5; rep from *
Rows 27 and 28: *P4, (k1, p1) twice, k4; rep from *
Rows 29 and 30: *P3, (k1, p1) 3 times, k3; rep from *
Rows 31 and 32: *P2, (k1, p1) 4 times, k2; rep from *
Rows 33 and 34: *P1, k1; rep from *
Rows 35 and 36: *K1, p1; rep from *
Rows 37 and 38: *K2, (p1, k1) 4 times, p2; rep from *
Rows 39 and 40: *K3, (p1, k1) 3 times, p3; rep from *
Rows 41 and 42: *K4, (p1, k1) twice, p4; rep from *
Rows 43 and 44: *K5, p1, k1, p5; rep from *

Repeat rows 1-44.

To read the chart, start on the bottom right (right side of fabric).  The next row, or return row, starts on the left with row two (wrong side of fabric).  The blank squares are knit on the right side (odd rows) and purled on the wrong side (even rows).  The dot squares are purled on the right side and knit on the wrong side.  The red lines indicate where the center pattern stitches are and repeats 14 times.  The 4 stitches on the left and right side of the chart are the border stitches.

Note:  I have not knit this blanket, only the 12x12 inch square (1 square foot) which took about 100 yds of yarn.  Our blanket is 30 square feet (5x6 = 30) and will require about 3000 yards of yarn.  Our yarn has 76 yds per skein so we will need about 40 skeins of yarn to complete this blanket (3000/76 = 39.4 ~40).  Please know this is only a rough estimate. 

Vicke, I'm hoping this is what you were looking for and look forward to seeing your finished blanket!  Again thank you for the great question!