The Simple, Soft, and Soothing Lullaby Blanket

Recently I realized that simple and meditative knits bring me tranquility. I find myself drawn to projects that are uncomplicated and soothing to knit. This desire for simple comforts, combined with the ambition to use my most beautiful materials, inspired me to create Lullaby, our newest simple-but-satisfying blanket design.

Although I adore beautiful things, I’m really not much of a shopper. The exception to this rule is shopping for materials: fabric, yarn, fibre, art supplies, beads… These are the sort of things I love to shop for, buy, and collect. Materials are so full of potential for pleasure, for creativity, for transformation — and I find all of this potential very enticing.

Since I read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo — and began following the sustainable fashion expert Aja Barber — my relationship to my THINGS has been changing. I’ve been feeling like there’s nothing worse than keeping the ‘good stuff’ hidden away. Instead, I want to share my space with exquisite materials and handmade things — so I can enjoy them on a daily basis. Life is just too short to keep beauty in a box. And so I set out to use these materials and create something both simple and beautiful.

The process of knitting a Lullaby is as soothing as wrapping it snugly around your shoulders. Soft waves of colour cascade over your knees as you knit, keeping you cozy and inspired by their ever-changing combinations. There is nothing complex, new, or groundbreaking here — just the comforting repetition of soft, undulating stripes. These gentle waves are shaped by a stitch pattern as old as the hills, like a lullaby passed down for generations, sung soft and low by a grandparent gently rocking their little one.

From fibre to fabulous

Lullaby, in all its simplicity, invites you to play with colour, texture, and halo to bring further richness and joy to the piece. The pattern includes three sizes and four yarn weight options, so there’s plenty of room to play.

In bringing Lullaby to life, I began with a delicious handspun yarn that sparked some serious joy for me. I started with two Lucky Dip fibre packs from Hedgehog Fibres, a weird and wonderful cornucopia of colour and textural bliss. Sometimes I like to NOT choose – and let others choose for me. Lucky Dip fibre packs are great for this. You get what you get, and then you work with it to make something unique and beautiful.

I decided to try a method that I’d seen of breaking up fibre into little tiny ‘nests’ and then spinning them together in random ways to blend a bunch of different colourways. Within the fibre pack, there were some warm colours (pinks, reds, rusts, purples), some cool colours (greens and blues), and some light colours (whites, pale tints, yellows).

I separated the nests into rough colour groupings and then spun and spun and spun to complete these lovely singles. I plied some of the singles together with themselves, and I plied some of them against other colour groups. In the end, I had 400g of the most joyful, rainbow-y, DK-weight, two-ply handspun yarn.

Yarn in hand, I wanted to cast on Right Away. The material was SO delicious, and I was itching to get started. So I thought, I swatched, and I thought and swatched some more. I finally decided that I would design the most simple of blankets in order to use up every last drop of yarn in a single project. I couldn’t let any of this beauty end up back in a plastic box! Lullaby was born, and it proved to be just right for satisfying my need for simple comfort and exquisite beauty. From start to finish, this project was a sensual delight, and I hope you find as much joy in it as I did.

How will I knit my next Lullaby blanket?

Well, I’ll probably make it a scrappy, marled rainbow. I have loads of really beautiful sock yarn scraps, and I’m always looking for ways to use them. Next week I’ll share my exploration of these ideas in a more detailed post about Lullaby colour options and strategies that I hope will inspire you.

~ Em