Crochet Afghan

Who says I am not a philanthropist? If I can give away a highly cherished and loved output of my 10 month’s hard work, that too to my MIL, then I don’t think I should settle on anything less then being called ‘Awesomely Great’ 😉

I started this crochet afghan in April of 2014 and finished it in Feb of 2015. It could have been completed couple of months early if I was not on traveling job half the time or could have somehow controlled on my ADD and focused on single project at once. But well, I guess that will be a unrealistic expectation from a person like me.  The Afghan finally met its fate only because my husband had plans to visit India this Feb and I made it my target to send the afghan with him.

I have made (or better say started) many tablecloths, sarees, bedsheets with embroidery, bead work etc over the years. How many of them were completed? All. How many of them were completed by ME? None.

I am not proud to admit that my ADD has so far hindered the completion of any big project I overtook. The main reason is not getting bored, I just have too many projects in my mind and if one is taking any longer then couple of weeks, I am highly likely to give away on the temptation to start something new. Also, when I was back in India, I had my mother and sister who will ‘help’ even if I don’t ask them to. 🙂

This afghan is one of the biggest projects I have done so far and the only big project I completed all on my own. 🙂

I wanted to gift something handmade to my mother in law. I had this thought in my mind from long before my marriage. I discussed with my husband to decide on color combination, though he was not much help, but I bugged him every day with new suggestions until I convinced myself ;).  After a lot of reading on types of yarn and compositions, I decided on Encore from Plymouth Yarn. With 75% Acrylic and 25% Wool, it is supposed to perform well even after regular use and machine wash.

I did not follow any pattern book or site for this afghan. I will try to explain the pattern best I could, assuming the reader has some experience with crochet and the stitches used.

Yarn – Plymouth encore – worsted weight

Colors Used

• Color 1 – Woodbine
• Color 2 – Christmas Green
• Color 3 – White

Stitches used

• Chain (ch)
• Half double Crochet (HDC)
• Fan Stitch (FS)
• Reverse Fan Stitch (RFS)
• Triple Crochet (TC)
• back stitch

Here is the high level description of how I made this

Fan Stitch Panel

1. ch XXX – color 1 (Adjust according to your desired length)
2. FS – color 1
3. HDC – color 3
4. RFS – color 2
5. HDC – color 3

Central Panel

Above steps makes the beautiful wavy stripes on your afghan. In -between these stripes, I have used following to make the cental Panel .

(I have used one color for the panel, color 1, woodbine)

• Row 1 TC
• Row 2 TC with back stitch
• Row 3 TC
• Row 4 TC with back stitch
• Row 5 TC
• Row 6 TC with back stitch
• Row 7 TC

Repeat these steps multiple times until you reach your desired width. I have done 7 rows, doing back stitch 3 times. This gave my panel 3 vertical lines.

To start another fan stitch panel, do a HBD with Color 3 and then continue with fan stitch. Rest of the pattern will remain same as explained

Border

I have used white and woodbine to create the border. HDC is used for both rows of border.

Feel free to ask me any questions / doubts you might have regarding the pattern. I know I have done a terrible job explaining.

Hope you like my my MIL’s Afghan 🙂

Happy crocheting!
 

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Tags: afghan, art, craft, crochet, Daughter in Law, design, free crochet pattern, free tutorial, green, memories, MIL, tutorial, white, yarn