a crochet story

[samuraigrrrl.livejournal.com]

i have just begun to crochet.
i've always wanted to know how, but never took the time to learn and well, i was a bit intimidated by the patterns.
they are like a completely foreign language!
but the other day, i picked up a better homes and gardens book from 1977... in the back of this book are the basic stitches and instructions for crochet and knitting.
i think i chose crochet because it only has one hook, as if that would somehow make things less complicated.
i got the hang of chain stitch...
and then single crochet!
and then double crochet!
and this strip is what i have so far:


it's long enough to be a baby blanket, which is what i eventually want to accomplish, but i didn't imagine that i'd do it in white, i just chose this simple yarn for practice.
the problem lies in the fact that i am now attatched to this first bit of stitching! and i don't want to just set it aside because it was "practice" and all of that work be unused!
so my question is: even though i have this much width of nothing but plain rows of single crochet and double crochet, could i at this point, start in with a pattern and then at the other side, just end with the same width of plain single crochet and double crochet rows so that it will have a sort of border? or would that look really dumb and i should just scrap it and start my actual pattern project fresh?