My wonderful Nan made a crochet granny blanket for my baby girl and it needed backing with fabric (to strengthen it and to stop little fingers getting caught). Thanks to everyone for the advice on how to do it (I did love Laura's suggestion of a crochet border) - I thought about it a lot and tried a couple of different things but here's what I ended up doing...
I cut backing fabric just bigger than the blanket (I didn't measure because I was trying to be quick but you want it 1/2" inch bigger on all sides so you can hem the fabric).
Then I folded the edges of the fabric over twice (about 1/4" each time), pressed them and stitched the fold down on each side. I kind of just mitred the corners as I went and tucked them in a bit to make them neat.
I used basting pins around all the edges to attach the fabric to the back of the blanket and then hand sewed a blanket stitch using perle thread to sew them together.
At this point I thought I would try quilting it on the sewing machine - it wasn't so successful. Maybe if the backing fabric wasn't so thin, or I had basted it better but it just looked messy. So a bit of unpicking and some thinking later I decided to look up tying a quilt. I found this great tutorial by Jera, which I would highly recommend. Basically you stitch through the layers at regular intervals, without cutting, until you've finished your length of yarn/thread. I used perle cotton thread and it was so very simple and amazingly fast to do.
You then cut between the threads and tie them together. After a bit of research I used a surgeon's knot when tying. There's a very simple youtube video tutorial but it's basically just making another twist over the thread before you pull the knot tight.
Then there you have it, a backed granny crochet blanket!
You hardly notice the bits of perle thread unless you're really looking closely and I'm going for a 'rustic' look with this one (thanks for that phrase Susan!). I also thinks it looks nice on the back, sort of tufty.
It's a really quick and simple way to back a crochet blanket and it's been getting lots of use!
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The blanket is lovely, I like the look of tied quilts. It does the job without over powering the finish.
This is awesome! I thought tying a quilt would be all sorts of work. I'm glad to hear it really isn't!
Aw, cute!
That is such a great blanket and great idea on how to back it. I'm thinking I should back my crochet blankets to give them more durability for the years to come.
Oh you are a clever sausage aren't you? It looks great! A tied quilt is on my list too after seeing a gorgeous picnic blanket some time ago. I need to go and pin that tute now!
What a wonderful idea, Lucy! Great job!
I have never seen that done before. This is my first FSD so hello and hope you can stop over at my blog!
what a great project!
Such a brilliant idea, Lucy!
It's lovely, well done, and I shall be back to read more closely for when I have finished my crocheted car blanket (for my little one on journeys), as I want to back that with fabric too : )
I'm so glad you found a solution, sorry the sewing machine way didn't work out.
I love the idea of tying it together, although the surgeons knot sounds very tricky!!!
It looks perfect!!
What. A great idea! Thanks for sharing how you did it :)
A lovely tufty rustic blankie! I think you have found the perfect solution...it is such a pretty piece of crochet. It will be loved and treasured for a long time!
Great finish!
So glad you persevered xxx
Ha, rustic, love it! Looks great though, glad you got it sorted
It looks lovely!
What a fabulous idea for the crochet blanket. I love the red and green block among the others!
A proper tied quilt does not last long, just thought I'd mention it.
What a good idea to make it even cozier :)
That's a great job, what a lovely thing to have from your Nan, you have given the blanket a much longer life without changing the integrity of it.
Wow, great fusion project. Thanks for linking up!
Love it! This turned out so cute :-) I love the combo.
I tried this for a twin size crocheted afghan and was not successful. I still had a tremendous amount of pucker in the sheet I used for the backing. Any other suggestions? It's a beautiful geometric optical illusion afghan with so many threads underneath I really want it covered. The puckers are not pretty.
Thanks for any advice you can share
Unknown - This was a small blanket. For a larger size I would recommend taping the backing down, ensuring it is flat and a larger size than the crochet. Then lay the crochet over the top and stitch the ties. Once it's all stitched then you can finish off the edges. Hope that helps!