A long time friend of mine contacted me after seeing a picture on the internet of a mermaid blanket. She loved them but they are expensive on Etsy and this friend is also 6 foot and some. Getting anything in her size is a challenge to say the least. She is such an amazing person and quickly gave me creative freedom and just asked not to make it overly girly (no pink). I still had a few balls left over from making Aryiana's halloween costume a few years back and some coordinating colors and went over to Ravelry to find a free pattern to work with.
www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/mermaid-tail-afghan
Changes to Pattern
Blanket: This blanket is made to order so I needed it to measure 70" without the tail. The decrease is only 10 rows so I worked my blanket until it was 3-4" shy of 70" and followed the decrease pattern. I also added a shell picot edge to the top of the blanket and stitched it down.
Tail: After working up the tail pattern and attaching it to my blanket I took a step back and realized the tail was way too small for this huge blanket, I needed to make it bigger. I just worked a few rows of SC around the bottom and 3SC in the corners of blanket and added the same shell picot in blue to the tail.
Sure hope she loves it! This beast took about 10 balls of red heart yarn in Wildflower, Blue, Green and Light Blue and almost two months to complete. Shell stitches take a lot of yarn but they have the scale effect that I wanted. Such a great idea and pattern. Have fun with the color changes and decorative edges to make each blanket unique. I can't wait to start on a kid sized one for my little girl, she will love it!
Thanks for taking a look and enjoy!