Mandy & Jared's Blanket

Mike & Jared have been friends since high school. When Jared married his high school sweetheart, Mandy, Mike was in their wedding. Mandy would always try to find Mike a woman, but had always told him she couldn't find someone good enough. So knowing all of this, I was obviously nervous the first time Mike planned us a dinner date with them. They were both so excited to meet me and I was instantly so happy Mike introduced me to them! To make a long story short...the four of us have been hanging out ever since.

Mandy & Jared were beyond thrilled when Mike proposed. The first time we saw them after our engagement, Mandy blurts out, "I'm doing your hair for your wedding! And I'll do your girls too!" I couldn't believe she said that! She's amazing. So later Mike and i were talking about it and he says, "you have to make them a blanket..." And so it began...

I searched design-seeds.com for the perfect color palette and then was off to Michael's to get the yarn! 

Of course I spent a good 40 minutes laying out the yarn in Michael's...

 And then the long journey of love began...It started in Harrisburg during my occupational therapy fieldwork...

It even traveled all the way to Block Island, Rhode Island!  

And it slowly grew...

It even grew to cover almost all of Mike! 

Dixie even got to snuggle with it during the process.

It traveled to Hollywood, Maryland (a.k.a The Country) where Mike acted as my blanket measurer...

Then it was time for a perfect border...

 And then it was complete! 

 And of course a photoshoot was necessary to capture all of it's beauty! 

I presented Mandy and Jared with the blanket after they helped us move all our stuff into our new apartment. They were so thrilled. They are just such a wonderful blessing in our lives and we are so excited to make many more fun memories with them!

Mandy loves the blanket! <3 

                                    

Edit: I forgot to put in the pattern I used! I learned it from this website: http://www.berroco.com/patterns/greenway 

It's a pretty easy pattern and I'm obsessed with it. 

Tech Specs: 

The aqua color is Loops & Threads Impeccable, the Cornflower blue & Yellow are Caron Simply Soft, the Brown & Beige are Vanna's Choice Lion Brand. I was nervous to mix yarn brands, but it turned out perfectly with some nice texture. All these yarns were around a 5.0-6.0 crochet hook, so I think I just used a 5.5 and it turned out lovely. 

I did the border a little thicker than the pattern because I wanted to add some extra width to the blanket. 

I probably used between 3-4 balls of each yarn, probably between 4-5 for the Vanna's Choice colors cause that yarn always runs out quickly.