Winter Project Link Party; February

This winter I have been joining with Jennifer at Thistlebear, in her cosy Winter Project Link Party. Bloggers gather monthly to share their current wip's and generally support each other through the long winter evenings of knitting, sewing, crocheting, and much more. Do pop over to Jennifer's blog, it is a lovely place to visit at any time.

This month I am sharing a knitting project. We have a new baby coming into the family in March of this year, and I am knitting him or her a baby blanket, which may or may not be finished in time. Thankfully new babies are unaware of lateness in gift giving, so I am not too stressed about it being ready exactly on the day.
The blanket pattern is called Peek a Boo, which I think is an adorable name. It is very plain, with just a tiny bit of texture on it for interest. There are two sizes of blanket to choose from; I chose the bigger one (finished size 75cm x 103cm), which I hope means it will be in use for longer. Each row has 183 stitches, and one row takes 5 or 6 minutes to knit (I am not a fast knitter). There are more than 300 rows, so this project will take a while. 
My preferred yarn is mercerised cotton; for this project I am using Drops Muscat Mercerised Cotton, double knitting weight. I like the very slight sheen from this yarn, and enjoy the clean, crisp feel against my fingers as I knit. It gives a smooth, tactile finish, and I will I hope be beautifully comfortable against the baby's new born skin. I have chosen classic white to make the blanket, which is of course suitable for both pink and blue varieties of baby.
The border is garter stitch, and the middle part is stocking stitch apart from the texture rows, which are very simple to do, thankfully.
I am using a circular needle. Initially I was concerned that I would end up unwittingly joining the ends together at the end of a row, and I spent some time at the end of each row figuring out how to turn the work and restart, but I am used to it now, and find the circular needles easy and comfortable to work with. The double knitting weight of this yarn would usually indicate a 4mm needle, but I have chosen a 3.5mm instead, as I want a firm texture, and find smaller needles more comfortable to use. 

The blanket is still very portable, being only 50 or so rows deep at the time of writing, so it has already had a few outings. It has been with me to Isaac's guitar lesson; to a fund raising coffee morning, and on the school run several times (those minutes waiting in the car are too precious to waste). I keep it in a drawstring bag which originally came with a pair of Camper shoes. I have several pairs of shoes from there, and have made good use of both canvas and carrier bags; both are strong and well made (I like the shoes too!).
I have had to temporarily lay aside the crochet scarf I wrote about last month, as the baby blanket will be needed before the scarf. I am also hand quilting a colourful hexie quilt, which I am looking forward to finishing; I feel I have been making it since dinosaurs roamed the earth; hopefully it will be finished in the next week or two. I hope I will have it finished in time to share on another Winter Project Link Party post.