The Wind in the Willows crochet blanket

We’re lucky to live near the beautiful Henley-on-Thames, and as my little daughter grew, we started visiting the playroom at Henley’s River & Rowing Museum. Every visit to the playroom also meant a stop at The Wind in the Willows Experience—a magical gallery that brings Kenneth Grahame’s beloved tale to life. 

I’ve always loved this story and its charming characters, so one day, I thought: Why not crochet a blanket featuring Mole, Ratty, Mr. Badger, and, of course, the ever-enthusiastic Mr. Toad?

I started by crocheting each character using the ‘circle to square’ method, adding appliqué details to bring their personalities to life. 

Mole, Ratty, Mr. Badger, Mr. Toad crochet granny square

But I didn’t just want to make characters—I wanted to tell their story with my hook. Since they all live along the river in the book, I decided to create a river scene as the foundation of the blanket.

That’s when I hit a challenge. The ‘river’ section I crocheted didn’t fit—not because of size, but because it wasn’t stretchy enough compared to the rest of the blanket. I needed a new approach. After some extensive research, I found a stitch diagram that looked promising, made a swatch, and—success!

You can find the tutorial for the stitch I used to create the ‘river’ section here 

To bring everything together, I used a zigzag slip stitch in green to join the squares to the ‘river’ section, mimicking the flowing willow branches that frame the riverbanks in the story. The same inspiration carried into the border, which alternates double crochet (dc) and dc-picot stitches, resembling delicate tree branches and leaves.

There’s actually a tip how to make your dc-picot look nice. You need to insert the hook into the side of the dc stitch you’re working the picot into 

Dc-picot stitch 

If you’d like to make your own Wind in the Willows blanket:

🧶 Yarn pack and a pattern available on WoolWarehouse website 
🧶 The characters’ granny square pack is available here.
🧶 The full blanket pattern, including the characters pack, is available here.