How to Knit a Simple Baby Blanket With Two Colors
If you’ve mastered casting on, binding off, the knit stitch and yarning over, you can put your knitting skills to use and create a simple baby blanket. Knitting this blanket on the diagonal, holding two different colors of yarn together, dresses it up without significantly increasing the difficulty. And at just 20 inches by 30 inches, a standard-size baby blanket knits up fast enough that you can make it as a nearly last-minute gift.
Other People Are Reading
Things You'll Need
- Size 8 circular knitting needle
- 2 colors of worsted-weight yarn
- Ruler or measuring tape
- Yarn needle
- Scissors
Instructions
-
-
1
Cast on three stitches, holding both strands of worsted-weight yarn together. Treat the two strands as if they are one individual strand of yarn.
-
2
Knit one stitch, then yarn over and knit the next stitch. In other words, bring the yarn to the front of the work between your knitting needles, then knit the next stitch as usual. Knit the last stitch in the row. You now have four stitches on your right-hand needle.
-
-
3
Turn your work and knit the first stitch, then yarn over and knit across the rest of the row. You now have five stitches on the right-hand needle.
-
4
Continue working each row in the same pattern — knit one, yarn over, then knit across the rest of the row — until the blanket is as wide as you want the finished blanket to measure across the diagonal. See Tips for a suggestion on how to measure across the blanket’s diagonal.
-
5
Turn your work and begin decreasing: Knit one stitch, then knit two stitches together, sliding the right-hand needle knitwise through both stitches at once and working them as if they were a single stitch. Knit across the rest of the row.
-
6
Continue the decrease pattern — knit one stitch, knit two stitches together, then knit across the rest of the row — until you have three stitches left on the needle.
-
7
Cast off the remaining three stitches. Snip the remaining strands of yarn, leaving about an 8-inch tail.
-
8
Thread any loose ends of yarn through a yarn needle and weave them into the body of the blanket for several inches. Snip the remaining yarn as close as possible to your work.
-
1
Tips & Warnings
The stitches of your baby blanket may bunch together on the circular needle, making it hard to measure the blanket’s width. Calculate how wide your blanket is getting by using a ruler or measuring tape to measure across one of the blanket’s lower rows, counting how many stitches are in one inch of knitting. Then count the number of stitches currently on your needles, and divide by the stitches per inch; this tells you how wide your blanket is. If you’ve achieved a gauge of 15 stitches per inch and you currently have 300 stitches on your needles, the blanket measures 300 / 15 = 20 inches across, about the right width for a baby blanket.
