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Winter's Embrace Christmas In July CAL crochet blanket prep
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Jun 23, 2025
See the Winter's Embrace page to sign up for updates: https://livechilllife.com/crochet-and-knit/winters-embrace-blanket-christmas-in-july-cal/ Get the PDF blanket pattern: https://livechilllife.etsy.com/listing/4316669577/winters-embrace-crochet-blanket-pattern or on Ravelry: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/winters-embrace-blanket-cal Subscribe to the newsletter for monthly discounts, tips and free patterns: https:livechilllife.com My books and project trackers: httpslivechilllife.comshop-my-books My vintage recipe cooking channel : httpswww.youtube.com@100yearoldrecipes My Etsy shop: https: livechilllife.etsy.com and https:www.etsy.comshopTinyCottageKitchen Social Media: Instagram: instagram.com/livechilllife TikTok: Livechilllife Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/people/Live-Chill-Life/61559059162110/
View Video Transcript
0:00
hello crochet friends This is the very
0:02
beginning of our Christmas and July
0:04
winter's embrace summer crochet along
0:07
And today I'm diving into one of my
0:09
favorite parts That is picking out yarn
0:12
colors and getting everything ready to
0:14
crochet Now if you've already signed up
0:17
check your inbox Your color guide and
0:19
materials list should be waiting for you
0:22
And if you're joining me a little later
0:24
and already have the PDF in hand you are
0:27
right on track We'll walk through the
0:30
color selection sheet together today
0:33
Plus if you're planning to make the
0:35
matching pillows too I'll also go over
0:38
how much extra yarn you'll need because
0:41
this blanket is designed to use up every
0:43
last bit of your skes and leftovers So
0:47
you will want a bit more for those cozy
0:49
bonus
0:50
pieces Also if you're not signed up for
0:53
the Winter's Embrace collection the link
0:55
is below You may want to do that so you
0:57
get updates as soon as I release more
1:00
home decor pieces in the collection Are
1:03
you ready Let's jump in and start
1:05
building your perfect holiday
1:09
palette Hello everyone In this video I'm
1:13
going to help you get ready to make the
1:16
Winter's Embrace Blanket for our 2025
1:19
Christmas in July crochet along And
1:22
first of all I want to orient you with
1:24
your pattern tracking your rows and then
1:28
we're going to talk about yarn color
1:30
choices So your pattern pages
1:35
um let's see you either have purchased
1:38
the PDF or you've signed up for the
1:40
crochet along and you've received your
1:42
initial pages for color selection Right
1:46
So what you're going to be looking at
1:50
here so I've got your grid just so that
1:53
you know what it's going to look like as
1:55
you work And we're going to start from
1:57
the winter berry this color our deepest
2:00
of reds and finish with the pine green
2:04
Okay So this will uh help you have an
2:07
orientation of what's going on I also
2:10
want to point out the tracking pages
2:15
So those are they're at the very end of
2:18
the pattern here Now you'll see you've
2:21
got your rows marked I don't have stitch
2:24
counts in here just your rows So we'll
2:27
be doing um color sectioning each week
2:31
as we work through our color sections
2:34
Now these are full pages full uh 8 1/2
2:38
by 11 size A4 if you're in Europe
2:41
whatever I'm sorry I don't know what
2:43
size that is but so these are full pages
2:46
This is going to eat up all of the ink
2:47
in your computer so I don't expect you
2:49
to be printing these out What you can do
2:52
is however you normally track your
2:54
projects Uh I
2:56
have let me grab I have project trackers
2:59
that are for sale Uh I know many of you
3:02
already have these but if you want to
3:04
grab one of these before things start
3:06
these are on my website and I'll link
3:07
them But you'll want to use the larger
3:11
blanket size in the back because there
3:13
are more than the midsize I have 180
3:17
rows The blanket sizes are in the back
3:20
330
3:21
rows here And then you mark your rows as
3:24
you go Or if you have something similar
3:27
way that you like to check things off
3:29
Otherwise what I did for when I'm making
3:32
this is I put the page into uh my graph
3:37
I'm a graphic designer so I put that
3:39
into my graphic design program and I'm
3:41
able to write on this If you have good
3:43
notes and you can write on your uh
3:46
tracking do that Or if you just manually
3:49
you know if you do your little check
3:51
offs do it that way But come up with a
3:53
way that you want to track your colors
3:57
because we always need to know when we
3:59
are on a even number side because that
4:02
is the side where we are introducing the
4:05
new
4:06
color All right So now let's talk You'll
4:10
see you've got many of these pages right
4:13
So we don't want to be using up all of
4:15
our printer ink on these things So come
4:17
up with your plan for how you want to
4:19
track your
4:20
rows All right Right So now let's go
4:23
back to the page of choosing
4:27
colors So you'll see that I have given
4:30
you three different brands in the United
4:33
States If you're here most of my c my uh
4:36
crocheters are US However of course
4:39
wherever you live you can make this the
4:42
brands that I know well enough in this
4:44
country that have a broad enough choice
4:47
of colors in this spectrum because it's
4:50
challenging to find enough colors in the
4:53
cool tone to do this project if you're
4:56
making the Christmas colorway as shown
4:58
Of course make whatever you
5:01
like I have for us Red Heart I love this
5:06
yarn That's the Hobby
5:07
Lobby And Premier Basics I do have a
5:11
review on my channel of Premier Basics
5:13
It's a very nice value yarn It's
5:18
soft Now the softest of the three is
5:20
going to be the I love this yarn which
5:23
not necessarily value yarn but when it's
5:26
on sale the prices are very comparable
5:28
but you can even see up close the
5:31
difference This has a slight more smooth
5:33
look and a tiny sheen This is I mean
5:36
honestly this is my favorite blanket
5:38
yarn but you use what you
5:41
like Premiere has a wonderful color
5:44
selection I'm very impressed with the
5:47
basics color selection Now I did have a
5:50
challenge here when we look at our
5:53
colors and I'm going to tell you what
5:56
that is But I first want to talk about
5:58
this color called fresh bark Okay these
6:01
are all winter color names that I made
6:03
up These are not the names of the yarn
6:05
colors These are the colors in the
6:08
pattern This is that light color And
6:11
I'll put a picture up on the screen but
6:12
it's going to be this area right here
6:15
You see this kind of light transitional
6:19
center color I did not make that white
6:22
for a reason You certainly can make it
6:24
white if you would like
6:26
However thinking about
6:29
practicality in the winter when we're
6:31
going to be using our holiday colored
6:33
blanket you've got all kind We've got
6:35
the animals coming in with muddy feet
6:38
We've got hot chocolate slloshing around
6:41
and you cannot bleach this blanket So I
6:44
feel like a more tonal light color
6:47
is better in this area So I used a
6:53
neutral bone
6:55
color You can use a really pale gray a
7:00
cool tone ivory which I used on the
7:03
pillow that you see in the
7:05
images or I mean if you're if you're
7:08
brazen go ahead and use white Okay So
7:10
you'll see in here I've got those color
7:15
options Now let's look at the greens So
7:18
when you look at the blanket our
7:23
transition out of that bark color is
7:26
this kind of soft greenish blue color
7:30
That's actually this one here that I use
7:31
called glacier And you can use a minty
7:34
color as long as it's cool Some colors
7:36
called
7:37
mint go a little bit more warm So we've
7:41
got to stay in that cool color tone for
7:43
these to work together Now spearmint
7:46
another greenish blue color It's going
7:51
to it could lean a little more blue It
7:54
could lean a little more green depending
7:55
on the brand you're using Now I've
7:57
looked at all of these specific colors
7:59
to make sure that they are in line with
8:03
the cool
8:04
tones Now this mid color is the one I
8:07
find the most challenging with this
8:09
color called leaf This greens I think
8:12
are kind of difficult anyway with yarn
8:14
I'm a green fanatic and I just don't
8:16
find a lot of great greens This is a mid
8:20
to deep green not as dark as this pine
8:24
color I did not find one in the I love
8:28
this yarn to match that So I used a
8:31
different
8:32
one that I found off the shelves and I
8:36
will put a picture up of of that But you
8:39
may need to go to your yarn store or
8:41
look to another brand to find that tone
8:43
if you are using I love this yarn Now if
8:46
you're going to mail order all your
8:47
colors you have them from Premiere or
8:50
Red
8:52
Heart And then the forest green you
8:55
should be able to find this in all of
8:56
the brands And these are the color
8:59
names And then now when we look at the
9:02
pink tones these are pretty easy to find
9:06
So we've got winter berry is a really
9:09
dark deep tone darker than a
9:13
cranberry and that will be our starting
9:15
color So for week one if you want to
9:18
just get that and the cranberry these
9:20
are the two we'll be using for week one
9:22
plus the palest of pinks So if you look
9:25
back up here this is week one We're
9:27
going to be
9:33
doing cover these two sections Okay And
9:37
your pace will be approximately seven
9:40
rows per day I don't want you burning
9:41
out your arm trying to get this done Of
9:44
course you go at your own pace but the
9:46
pattern will be dropping um assuming
9:49
that you keep up with doing about seven
9:51
rows per day
9:55
And then from there uh we're going to be
9:57
using this color called Cherry Snow This
10:00
is kind of a
10:01
mauve
10:04
tone So I've got Rosy Cheeks from I Love
10:07
This Yarn Light Mau Light Raspberry
10:10
They're almost identical in all the
10:14
brands So the only challenge you're
10:17
going to have might be later in the
10:19
project towards the end is this leafy
10:22
color
10:25
Premiere the Dollar Tree Premiere that
10:28
they have the just yarn they have a
10:30
green that will work I've got to find
10:32
the name for it but if you do have
10:34
access to the just yarn at Dollar Tree
10:37
they do have this kind of deep mid green
10:40
tone
10:41
yarn I made the pillow with the Premiier
10:45
Basics And then the blanket is the uh I
10:49
love this yarn and I actually found I
10:52
did have a ball of Super Saver in my
10:55
stash I you can see I haven't used it I
10:57
don't think I've ever used this yarn
10:58
I've used the ombre for one project
11:02
years ago Um and I must have bought this
11:04
for a project I had in mind So feeling
11:06
it now This is the least soft of the
11:09
three but it has the colors and fabric
11:12
softener is your best friend It can turn
11:14
a frog into a prince Okay so give your
11:17
blanket a rinse with a really nice maybe
11:20
like the Downey uh Ultra That is a
11:23
wonderful yarn conditioner for your
11:26
blankets All right so I wanted to talk
11:29
about the color choice here as well
11:32
I used a color called Aaron for my
11:35
pillow and then I used a little bit of a
11:38
darker color for my bark in the blanket
11:42
because as I mentioned the uh for me you
11:46
know everyone's household is different
11:48
The potential for candy
11:52
um uh hot chocolate just wintry sloshing
11:57
around of warm drinks tea might for some
12:01
reason ricochet onto the blanket The
12:04
pillow the what my lifestyle there's
12:06
almost no chance of that happening So I
12:08
went ahead and used the lighter color So
12:10
this as I said it's called Aaron It's a
12:13
cream tone It's kind of a neutral cream
12:16
tone almost borders warm but not quite
12:20
And I like the brightness and definition
12:23
it gives against the other colors
12:26
Now in the sunlight let's get these reds
12:28
in the sunlight The uh winterberry and
12:32
the cranberry tones next to
12:36
the same colors
12:38
in the I love this yarn look identical
12:43
They did a great job I mean you really
12:45
can almost not tell them
12:50
apart and my rosy mauve
12:55
color very very very very close So you
12:58
will still get this kind of same result
13:00
you see using the colors that I've
13:03
recommended on that
13:04
chart And again handling these the I
13:08
love this yarn It's soft the softest of
13:11
all of them And I have not treated
13:14
this but there's uh nothing wrong with
13:17
this yarn And you'll be if you've never
13:20
bought Premier Basics the color
13:23
selection and again I'll link the review
13:25
that I did for these is
13:35
gorgeous While we are talking about yarn
13:38
choice I want to talk about the pillow
13:41
just a for a moment um or however long
13:44
it
13:45
takes for your planning purposes because
13:48
if you need to mail order your yarn and
13:50
you want to make sure that you have
13:52
enough to make pillows Also I want to
13:56
give you an idea of yarn amounts Uh I
13:59
would imagine many of you are going to
14:00
want to make the pillow because a color
14:03
block blanket on its own can look a
14:04
little crazy It's it depends on your
14:08
taste Of course we're all different and
14:09
we have different home styles but just
14:11
to make a really nice pillow to go with
14:14
it takes it from that kind of wild
14:17
random piece that's just sitting on your
14:19
sofa into something that looks put
14:21
together and stylish And why not make it
14:24
right Okay So here's our blanket Now
14:29
uh I have the pillow yardage It's in the
14:31
pattern but I'm going to just let you
14:32
know now again for planning purposes I
14:35
have plenty of yarn left to make a
14:37
second pillow Now if you want to make
14:39
one in the green color way and then one
14:42
in the red that would be really fun I
14:45
think And if you're making this in a
14:47
year round color then you might want to
14:49
make them in the same what it's up to
14:51
you You know you make your own pillow
14:52
it's your uh project and you can get
14:56
creative with the colors So you can see
14:58
here I haven't used this one yet So I
15:00
made my pillows with the Premier Basics
15:03
My blanket is with the I love this yarn
15:05
The colors are pretty much
15:09
identical So for the
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um pillows the larger amounts for this
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section and then the final section it's
15:19
about 90 yards And then these big 7 oz
15:22
skes
15:23
have 330 to 380 yards depending on which
15:28
brand you're using That is plenty to
15:30
make a second pillow So just plan on
15:32
that Uh the pattern will be available by
15:35
the time you're watching this color
15:36
video if you want to pick that
15:39
up and make it you know before uh
15:42
Christmas and once you're done with your
15:44
blanket So go ahead and if you're
15:46
ordering online just get your uh extra
15:49
yarn at that time
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