Adventures in Blocking and More on Jogless Stripes

I've completed the Fibonacci Scarf and have some news to report back from my adventures in blocking.  I had heard some real horror stories from friends about blocking mishaps so I was more than a bit hesitant to experiement with three weeks of hard work.  However, I'm shocked to say that it was a piece of cake.  

I used the spray blocking technique, which basically involves pinning the item in the shape that you want to end up with, spraying it down with water, and waiting for it to dry.  I laid the scarf out on our guest room bed, with a towel and sheet underneath to protect the mattress and pinned the scarf right into the mattress.  I used an old quilting block square that I had left over from my quilting days to help ensure that I was pinning the scarf out reasonably evenly.  I also made sure that my "jogless stripe edge" was laid out to be one of the scarf seams just to ensure that they wouldn't show.

Here are some shots of the scarf all laid out and pinned.

I then sprayed it down, turned the fan on in the room and left it overnight to dry.  And here are the results....

The scarf is now perfectly even and straight and the majority of my jogs diasppeared.  I'm extremly pleased with the results even though I was still on the fence about how I felt about my jogless slip stich experiment.  

Just for fun, I knit up the Bella Hat on Sunday without using any method to avoid jogs and blocked it last evening to see how it would turn out.  

Here it is pre-blocking.  As you can see the color changes have left quite a few jogs.

Here's a shot of it pinned out.

And here it is post-blocking.  Hopefully, you can see that the majority of the jogs are gone.  It's not perfect, but it's pretty close.

The verdict is....blocking is apparently magic and is a much better alternative to the slip stitch method because it doesn't create loose fabric.  Also, the Bella Hat is adorable and a quick and fun knit that I'm hoping my college age cousin will enjoy as a Christmas present.  I highly recommend it.  

Check back in on Friday when I'll be bringing you a new feature, Finished Object (FO) Fridays which will include a better shot of the Bella Hat and some other projects I've been working on.