Being a self-taught knitter means you don’t really have anyone to show you the ropes. Instead of the reliable, knowledgeable friend that you can reach out to with questions you have google. Don’t get me wrong, I love google. Anyone that knows me knows I love googling something to find out the answer in the middle of conversations just to get the peace of mind that comes along with knowing the answer to something (it doesn’t matter if it’s song lyrics, some actor that was in a movie, or a certain culinary term…if I don’t know the answer and I feel like I should I’ll be googling it shortly).
Here’s the dangerous part about that though–it’s very easy to ignore the answers you don’t want to listen to. It took almost seven years of knitting for me to even really start reading about blocking, and at that point I was still convinced that acrylic yarn was basically the same as wool bases so it never really applied to what I was doing. Yes, there are ways to block acrylic pieces, but seeing as I only have an iron at the moment and I’m not nearly as coordinated as I wish I was, I’ll hold off on a post about blocking acrylic.
Little by little I began reading more about blocking and eventually resigned myself to the fact that I need to pony up and start blocking finished pieces. Blocking seems to be a contentious practice among a lot of knitters. It seems like half of the knitting world insists you have to block finished pieces while the other half kind of shrugs their shoulders and says it isn’t necessary. While I’m by no means the world’s foremost expert on knitting, I’ve got a lot of opinions and this is my little corner of the world where I can ramble on as much as I want to and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. So let’s talk about blocking, shall we?
Whether you’re working on a simple scarf or a complex lace shawl blocking allows the pattern to open up and lets the yarn really shine. And yes, it applies to both knit and crocheted items. My friend Dominique from Domiknits Creations was kind enough to provide some photos of her most recent project the Traveling Shawl to show how important blocking can be for your finished products!
Blocking involves soaking the finished product for at least 15 minutes in tepid water. I like to add in some sort of soak/wash to help soften the fibers a bit. Lately, I’ve been using Eucalan with the lavender essential oil, but since it’s summer and I just got a monster bug bite I went and bought the grapefruit oil Eucalan (which in my mind will magically make all bugs go away).
After you’ve let your finished piece soak in the water for at least fifteen minutes squeeze out the excess water being careful not to wring the fibers. If the yarn can handle it I’ll sometimes wrap the project in a towel and roll it up to get rid of some of the extra water, but I only do this for worsted weight projects and up.
Finally, you’ll want to pin the project or use blocking wires to open up the pattern. You can see Dominique just used a towel and some push pins which works just as well as blocking mats!
And that’s all you have to do! You can let your piece sit out until it has dried and then remove the pins and wear your finished product around town!
This picture is a great example of how important blocking can be: the bottom picture is the headband before it was blocked. You can barely see the lace pattern and I actually had to use double pointed needles just go get the headband to lay flat and not curl. After blocking the piece the lace pattern opened up and the headband was able to lay flat on it’s own!
Blocking allows the finished piece to open up and fall the way that it’s intended to making for a better fitting finished product that also looks more polished. If you’re not ready to commit to a set of blocking mats and pins, that’s fine! Just use a clean towel and some push pins and you’re good to go! Now go out there and block some stuff! It’ll be worth the effort!