Bordering Afghans

I finally finished all the edging and thought about what pattern I would use to border this beautiful group collaboration effort, that I was responsible for unifying. My first thoughts were:

1. Borders should unify, and somehow reflect the general nature of the afghan.
2. Borders have a ‘less is more’ mentality. If you think you’re done, you probably are and shouldn’t add any more.
3. Borders shouldn’t overpower the afghan. The focal point should be on the main part of the afghan.
4. Borders need to work within the confines of how big you want the afghan to be, how much yarn you might not have left, etc.

With this in mind, I decided to do a modified version of my own Border Make X, which is a pattern I originally developed for the Maggie Muggins Mystery 2014 Afghan and works very well for other applications.

So I first added a simple hdc edging in the same color (cranberry) that I planned for the X’s, working to the guidelines of 6 x minus 1, plus 5 corner sts (which is the count needed for the Make X border).
Then, instead of 4 repeats of border, I worked two. So, one round of silver blue cluster groups, then one round of X factor (hehe), and one more round of silver blue cluster groups, and a final X round.
I followed that by a simple sc edge, working sc in each ch-1 sp, and 3 sc in each ‘X’ sp, with a fphdc over the sc in the middle of the cluster groups.

Then I worked a final round of simplified picot.

So,
RND 1: cranberry edging on the join edge
RND 2: Make X cluster group in silver blue
RND 3: cranberry Make X
RND 4: repeat RND 2
RND 5: repeat RND 3
RND 6: work sc in each ch-1 sp, 3 sc in each X sp, fphdc over sc in middle of cluster groups, in cranberry
RND 7: picot edge as follows: *(sc in st, ch2, sl st in first ch, sc in same st), sk next st*, rep around * to *, working no skips in corner 3 sts.

BEFORE


AFTER

DETAIL of CORNERS

DETAIL of SIDES