When we were small, our Mum made ponchos for my sister and me, in a chevron design. I probably have the pattern somewhere but haven’t looked yet! She made a maxi version for one of her closest friends, too.
The poncho appears to be making a comeback. The shops around here have a good number on the remaining racks of winter stock, and this particular pattern seems enormously popular amongst crocheters around the world. It comes from Simply Crochet issue 25 and is by designer Simone Francis.
Lucy at Attic24 made her own version which has doubtless increased its popularity. I delayed at first as I had plans for a sweater but then realised that the yarn left from making my girls’ blankets would be perfect.
This first one is for our seven-year-old who is a blue-green sort of a girl, just like me. It’s made with Stylecraft Special DK, mostly the remnants from making her blanket but with an extra 3/4 ball of Aspen used for the cowl neck. I worked the cowl as in the pattern but with a 5mm hook, then 22 Granny stripes and a border based on Lucy’s Cosy edging with a 4.5mm hook.
Post stitches are great for adding texture to crochet textiles. They can be used to make a rib stitch, as in the poncho, or for basketweave, cables and many other textured patterns. This page from Renate Kirkpatrick’s blog has some handy pictorial guides to crochet stitches, which I find very useful and especially so for the post stitches.
For the edging, I adapted the Cosy Blanket edging, working a round of dc (sc) into the last Grannny row (2dc in the corners), then *dc, ch1, skip 1* (dc, ch2, dc in the corners)for the next round and finally *dc, ch1,dc* into the dc stitches that were skipped in the second round of the edging (dc, ch2, dc in the corner spaces of the previous round).
On the hook now is one our younger daughter, using the Cosy blanket remnants with some extra Raspberry and Pale Rose. I used a slightly different method for the cowl, so rather than ch1 and working the front post stitch into the base of the chain, I worked a chainless starting treble (US double) and counted that as the first back post treble, then worked a front post treble in the next stitch. I’ve just finished the cowl and am looking forward to planning the stripes, though that will in part depend on how much I have left of each colour.
nelnanandnora 
I remember the poncho – and the thing that I remember most is that they were not in the least bit cosy. The wind just whistled around and about! lol
LikeLiked by 1 person