Picking up stitches

[F2F]

I'm new here and I'm confused by one of the directions in a pattern I am working on. I am knitting a blanket and I am doing a border for the very first time. It has asked me to pick up 61 stitches on the vertical edge, but there are far more than 61 rows on the vertical edge. There is 6 colour changes with 18 rows per colour, plus an 8 row border at the top and bottom. Am I picking up on stitch for every 2 rows? Can someone hel