And it’s snuggly!

Not only is Motley officially finished:

I’ve also posted a full pattern for it in the Knitting Patterns section, above. The pattern also includes directions for Hollow Point Edging – a new, quasi-original finish.  Complete with a short-rowed turned corner, in both chart and prose.

How did the end of this project go?  Quickly and not very quickly at the same time.  Knitting this was a breeze.  I cast on the week before Thanksgiving, and finished on Friday last, minus a week spent knitting fingerless gloves.  That’s a rather large sofa throw in fingering weight in three weeks of evenings.  BUT the last two days were a slog:

That’s one evening’s worth of orts from the Dreaded Darning In The Ends phase.  No doubt about it – Motley had a lot of ends.  I looked into various knit-in as you go methods, but I wasn’t convinced of their durability in a blanket, so I did it the hard way.  Still, I had nowhere near as many ends as the look of the blanket presents.  Remember, most of my yarns were leftovers from self-stripers.  That means color changes without ends.  A joy!

One last note – although I usually block my finished pieces, I did NOT block Motley.  The reason I didn’t is because of the wide variety of yarn densities and gauges used.  I was afraid that while everything is nice and flat now, if I were to block the thing, each fragment would behave differently, leading to cupping, sagging, or differential stretch.  So I punted and let it it sit, as is.

I do hope that someone else attempts this one.  It’s fast, it’s fun, and if you use up that dratted bag of leftovers that’s taking up space in the back of your closet – it’s practically free.