Swatching For A Mitered Square Blanket

 The blanket I am currently working on, and hope to finish in the next week, is making me want to get started on a mitered square blanket.  I have watched Cheryl Brunette's mitered square afghan YouTube videos multiple times and think now might be the time to get started.  This is the year I have mentioned for using up all the yarn so a good time to get rolling on mitered squares.  I am making progress on the using it up project: the acrylic is almost half gone.  The wool yarn, fabric, and fiber is another story altogether...!

Since I definitely buy into the idea of knitting swatches before knitting a big project, I thought I would make some swatches for this blanket and get an idea of what I like and what I don't like.

These four swatches taught me things I wanted to know.  The upper left swatch is knitted with an odd number of stitches...in this case 31 stitches.  This necessitates, at least for me, moving stitch markers.  It is a nice-looking block with a nice definite diagonal line across the front of the square.

The rest of the swatches are even numbers of stitches--30 stitches here, and uses one stitch marker in the middle.  The bottom left swatch was knit to two stitches before the marker then SSK was done, the marker moved and a K2Tog knitted then finished the row.

The bottom right swatch was knit the same except that I switched the SSK and K2Tog so...knit to two stitches before the marker then K2Tog, slip marker, then SSK.  I liked the look of this better than the opposite one.

These first three swatches used the cable cast on.  I did not really like how it looked so the upper right swatch was cast on using the German Twisted Cast On, 30 stitches with marker between stitch 15 and stitch 16, then K2Tog, slip marker, SSK, knit to end of row.  All the alternate rows on all of the swatches were plain knitting.

As far as I am concerned, the upper right swatch is the one I will use.  

OH, BIG FORGET!  The first stitch of every row was slipped purlwise with yarn in front and the last stitch on every row was knit through the back loop.  This gives a beautiful chain for picking up when it is time to add in the next square.  

There are many videos for making mitered square blankets/afghans.  I suggest watching a few of them, then make your own swatches to see what you like.  I used the same yarn and the same needles so I could really tell. In this case it was I Love This Yarn and US 8 needles.  I think it is entirely satisfactory.  I will probably watch Cheryl Brunette again and follow her number of stitches to cast on since I like the idea of multiple size squares in the same blanket.  I just think I will use these easy to follow decreases because the stitch marker stays in the same place all the time so no real thinking is involved.

Please feel free to comment on my decision.  I might still change my mind since I am not ready to start...