How to... Wet Blocking

I'm on the verge of having all of the Tunisian crochet rectangles complete for the Periodic Table Blanket, and today I blocked a lot of them and thought I'd show you how I do it.

Tunisian crochet has the tendency to curl up, when I finish the individual rectangles that make up the blanket they look like churros =)

There are several methods you can use to block crochet, I use the wet blocking method.

1. Place the pieces you want to block into a bowl of water and let it soak for a while.

2. Squeeze out the excess water without twisting the rectangles. Lay the pieces on your flat surface and pin the corners. I use my ironing board but you can use a blocking board, foam play mats for children or any other surface that is flat and padded.

3. Pin the edges down. For the rectangles worked with just one color I just pin the top and bottom edges, but for rectangles worked with more than just one color I pin down all the edges.

4. Wet a towel, or more, squeeze the excess water out and lay it on top of the rectangles.

5. Let the crochet and towels dry and take the pins out. The rectangles will be flat!

Because today I blocked a big amount of rectangles, I ran out of sewing pins with the plastic ball head (like the ones shown in the pictures above). All that I had left were pins with the tiny metal head and due to the amount of pins I was using my fingertips began to hurt. 

I looked to the side where my glue gun was and had this fun idea: I will make my own plastic headed pins!

Because I don't want your fingers to hurt too, I'm sharing here what I came up with. =)

1. With the glue gun squeeze out a drop of glue on top of wax paper or the paper that serves as backing for stickers.

2. Make four to six drops at each time.

3. Stick the head of the pin into the drop of glue (beginning with the drop that was made first) but don't press it all the way down to the paper.

4. Let the glue dry.

5. Take the pins out of the paper and you have your own sewing pins with plastic heads!

This will make the job much easier and your fingertips will thank you. =)

Happy Crocheting!