Repairing a crochet bedspread, and preserving a family heirloom

So, I keep hearing how amazing something I did is, and how in awe some people are, but to be truthful, I don't think I did anything that incredible. Yeah, I'm proud of myself because I did something new, and it worked better than I though it was going to, but I don't really see it as anything as amazing as others have said. I will admit to a guilty flush of pleasure at hearing other people praise my work, but all I did was fix an old blanket.

I've had a few people ask me how I did it, and, well a picture is worth a thousand words, so here's a few for you. I've had a few more admit that they never thought about repairing a blanket like this, and wouldn't know where to begin, so hopefully this will help.

Original damage

I got lucky, this was right on a seam, so I didn't have to try to pull tension just perfect like if it had been in the middle of a piece. I sat down with my thread and a bunch of hooks, and just kept making the center of the square with each different hook until I matched the gauge. Ended up with size 5 steel hook, and size 10 thread.

The pattern is a pretty simple center out block, with popcorn stitches up to the edges on a double crochet background as the design. The popcorn stitches took a little playing around but eventually I noticed they were treble crochet grouped in 5.

I decided I wanted to rebuild the damaged part, as this was bottom center of a bedspread, and would be very visible if used. I had originally thought of trying to sew it back together, but like the perfectionist I am, I couldn't bring myself to do that. I started to carefully pick out the damaged thread, and unraveled stitches until I got to a point where the thread was still good, and tied the thread off at the top of a stitch. I got really lucky, there were more good stitches left on the lower rows, than on the rows above them, so I didn't have to pull out good stitches, or try to pick them up from the bottom as I went.

First half damage picked out and tied off. 

Once I got this damage cleaned out, I attached with a slip stitch to the top of the bottom right popcorn, leaving a long tail, probably at least 6 inches. I then worked the missing 3 double crochet between the two popcorn stitches, slip stitched into the top of the left popcorn, tied it off and left a long tail again. For the top row, again, I attached to the right popcorn, made 3 double crochet, a 5 treble crochet popcorn in the next double crochet, then three more double crochet, and attached to the left popcorn. The result was this:

First half repaired

Now to repeat on the other half, clean it out, and restitch the missing parts. This time I had a bit more to remove and re-do. I ended up needing to redo two popcorn stitches on this side, but thankfully only one row needed work. There was still a good double crochet stitch to the right of the missing part, so I tied that off securely, and used a slip stitch to join new thread to it. Then I filled in the two missing double crochet, a popcorn, three more double crochet, another popcorn, and one final double crochet. Joined to the existing stitch on the left with a slip stitch, and tied off securely.

Second side cleaned out.

New work filled in

I don't have a picture of it, but I tied the new and old strings together at the beginning and end of each row, but didn't trim them. I left them long, so it can be washed once or twice to make sure it'll hold, then I'll weave them in and make it all neat and tidy.

Unfortunately, this blanket sat in a smoker's house for a while before they quit smoking, and it doesn't seem like it got cleaned after they quit. It was a really weird dingy yellow, probably from a combination of age, and  smoke. So I ended up soaking it in the bathtub with some Seventh Generation Oxy Clean.

Oxy is all bubbly and working it's magic

The color of the water after soaking for only ten minutes. YUCK!!! 

After soaking it a second time, and feeling it was mostly clean, I had to figure out how to rinse this thing. Rinsing it out made me wish I had a giant pool, or lots of helping hands. Thankfully we have one of those shower heads you can detach and use as a sprayer, so I situated the blanket as spread out as I could and spray. I had tried draining and refilling the tub with water and gently swishing the blanket around, but it just didn't seem to get clearer water even after several rinses. So I used that sprayer part to start at one end of the blanket and rinse and shift and rinse until all the water was running out clear. I don't think I've spent that long in a bathtub since I was a kid and played in the tub in the summer to cool down!

Once it was all rinsed, I rolled it up and tried to squeeze out as much water as I could. This blanket in over 50 years old, so I was trying not to put too much stress on it. I didn't really want to have to make more repairs. Once it was as dry as I could get it, I tried to pick the thing up. Yeah, not happening. I think it had to weigh 50 pounds. Big, strong husband to the rescue. He picked it up (didn't look that heavy at all when he did it!) and carted it to the washing machine for me, and I put it through a couple gentle rinse and spin cycles, just to make sure it was all rinsed out.

It still weighed quite a bit after that, but more manageable. I didn't want to put it through the dryer, and being winter, and colder than the freezer outside, I draped it over the ironing board, and one of the couches to dry. It made a great little tent! It took a couple of days to dry, but it finally did, and it was so much whiter.

The repaired section after the cleaning. Much, much less noticeable. 

I packed it back up to give back to my mother-in-law, and waited till Christmas day. I'm glad I did, because she was so happy to have it back and repaired. Here's a few shots of the bedspread on her guest bed.

The repaired section is right in the middle at the bottom edge of the mattress.

This one I just thought was a cool shot

So that's it, that's what I did. I repaired an old blanket. My mother-in-law remembers her mom working on this when she was just a child. Now it'll be a family heirloom to be passed on to future generations.