My granny square crochet blanket in progress

Update - Here's the finished crochet granny square blanket!

I've been wanting to crochet a granny square blanket for ages. Like many of my crafting projects, I'm sure that Pinterest had a lot to do with the inspiration, and you can see my Crochet Blanket board at the bottom of this post. I had a bit of a shaky start when it came to getting to grips with crochet, but with the completion of my gorgeous crochet Afghan I'm feeling pretty confident, and I'm very much looking forward to starting the Sky Blanket project in January.

As part of my learning to crochet process I started making granny squares. They were pretty terrible at first, but I persevered and eventually they started to look alright. Some of my early squares have mistakes in, where I've started working a new colour on the wrong side of the square or I'm missing one of the groups of trebles in the corner, but I'm still going to use them in the blanket, nobody's perfect!

Each square is made of five rounds with the outer round always the same colour (and I really that hope I don't run out!). This is a blue yarn that I bought in Hobbycraft ages ago when I first had the idea of making a blanket. Most of the other yarn was given to me by my Mum in blue, cream and purple, and I've bought a few more purple balls since. The finished blanket will measure 13 squares by 11 squares for a total of 143 squares. I might do a border as well, I'll see how big it is and how much yarn I have left over!

I don't have a plan at all when it comes to the distribution of the colours having gone for a cheerfully random selection, so I'm hoping that it all works out well in the end. I'm vaguely trying to alternate light and dark colours as I go around but that's about it. I'm going to have to find myself a huge space somewhere in the house and lay out all the squares in a way that pleases me, it's going to be like an enormous logic puzzle trying to make sure that all the colours are balanced. Then I'll have to sit there for hours and hours sewing them all together!

It's quite a slow process, I reckon that it has been taking me almost an hour to make one square (!) but it's a good project that I can take out and about with me. Progress will slow down I'm sure once I get started on my sky blanket, but I can take the squares with me when we go away and I don't want to be lugging a huge blanket about. I've made 50 squares so far, so just a few more to go!

Here are some blankets that have inspired me, many are beyond my current skill level but maybe one day if I keep practising!