Photo-a-Day - August 2013 - Day 14: Original

This is my latest project, shown with my handsome T.S. Elliot, for Stitches from the Heart, a charity which donates baby items to over 1,400 NICU centers and hospitals around the country.  There is a story behind this blanket.

I don't know when I first learned about Hudson's Bay points blankets.  [from Wikipedia] "A Hudson's Bay point blanket is a type of wool blanket traded by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) in British North America (now Canada) and the United States during the 18th century and 19th century. The blankets were typically traded to First Nations and Native Americans in exchange for beaver pelts."  Being one who loves history and the Northeast US and Canada, they always appealed to me but they are expensive, so I've never had one.

When I started looking for my next blanket pattern, I thought of the Hudson's Bay blanket and decided I'd base mine on that.  Off I went.  I didn't have quite the right green, but thought it would do.  I worked relentlessly for two days and finished the traditional four stripes.

And then I went back and looked at a photo of the actual blankets:

Do you see the problem?  It took me a minute to realize I had reversed the navy and green stripes.  I nearly cried.  Then I took a deep breath and weighed my options.

1.  Frog (take out) all the stripes I'd stitched.
2.  Ignore it and assume that whomever received it wouldn't know about Hudson Bay blankets.

Neither of those options really appealed to me.  Then, the light went one and, once again, I believed that there are no problems without solutions waiting to be found.  

Thus, I have created the Oakland Bay Blanket!  It's my own original design of reversing the stripes back out from the center navy stripe.  It's not quite half done, but I have to say, I really do like it.  

Problem solved.