Turning a Drawing into a Custom Lap Blanket

How to get this                                                                           from this ...





















First off, welcome!

This is a custom project I recently finished for an Etsy customer. Members of a family asked if I could create a blanket for someone using their own drawing. Yes! And here's a quick run through of how I made it happen.

First I took the picture provided and used KnitPro to create a graphed version. It's a free version and there are several similar sites and products. Bare in mind this site is very useful and typically works really well. However, there are some occasions where certain pictures just don't turn out right. It's at that point that I have to pop open Excel and the headache ensues. I'm kidding. It's not really that bad, but creating the graph and picture, using the fill tool can be time consuming. And at times frustrating. (I've made a lot of custom patterns this way.)

Stick it in the generator and out pops something like this:
For mine I chose XL (120 X 160) and then I added about 10 or so stitches on each side and the top and bottom to make it larger. (You might have to color in the squares to make them darker or pick and choose which ones to use along the way. Because of shading there are some grey areas, quite literally.)
You then follow along the chart working back and forth like a graphghan. Video Tutorial (She does a great job.) When finished I put a nice red and black border on it to pull it all together.

I use these types of graphs so much. Cross stitch, graphghans, tapestry crochet, filet crochet etc. It's my favorite tool whether I'm building my own in Excel or using KnitPro.


If you'd like something custom made or just curious about it, check out my shop, catch me on Facebook, or comment here.

And there ya go.
Thanks for stoppin' in.
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