Lion Brand Notebook ®
Temperature blankets are a hot trend (no pun intended) in the crafting world, and the start of a new year is the perfect time to begin yours! It’s a fun, year-long project.
To make one, work a row for each day in a color that corresponds to that day’s temperature. You can knit or crochet them, it doesn’t matter. If you stick to a simple pattern for either craft you will end up with a beautiful finished project. No need to be fancy because the colors are what matter here.
See the sample color chart below. You can alter it to suit your own preferences if you want. In New York City, we see temperatures from frigid to sweltering at different times of the year. If your climate is vastly different, you may not need all of these categories. This was made for Vanna’s Choice® yarn, and you can always substitute other colors.
Of course, you don’t have to make this for the upcoming year. Use this handy website to create a pattern for any year and location. This is great for commemorating a big life event. For example, make one for the year and location a couple was married as an anniversary gift, or the first year of a new baby’s life.
If you want to make it for yourself, try the year you were born. It’s also fun to compare years. I generated one for my birth year and place as an example, and another in the same zip code for 2015. There are actually a lot of differences.
You definitely want to keep the pattern itself basic and simple. You may not even want to work from a pattern, and just do plain garter stitch or single crochet. A simple chevron can add a little interest without distracting from the colors, too.
If you’d rather have a set pattern to work from, these are good choices:
You must be <a href="https://blog.lionbrand.com/wp-login.php?redirect_to=https%3A%2F%2Fblog.lionbrand.com%2Fstart-temperature-blanket-new-year%2F">logged in</a> to post a comment.
Chrissie Purcell
365 rows????
Liza
Yeah…it gets long. You could always stop midway and make a separate blanket for the second half of the year.
angela1a
One of these days, i am going to get some of the cashmere yarn.
Tabby Cat Mom
I’m planning the temperature blanket in 2017. I’m going to try to do it in the moss stitch
Liza
Nice!
Lisa
Is there a weather site for Australia?
Carol Fitzhugh
Try doing a search for “weather Australia.”
shelia
I used https://www.wunderground.com to get records for 1974/5. I just double checked and it is world-wide. 🙂
shelia
I saw a post on fb by a gal who was going to do 31 stitch wide for each month (creating a square) and use a neutral color for the days that don’t have 31 days and then put the squares together so it would be shorter than 365 rows. I am going to do our wedding year, starting with wedding day and going to first anniversary using the squares for a surprise anniversary gift for hubby this year.
vrazz
What about those of us who have negatIve temps?
Liza
You’d have to add a few categories at the bottom. So like, -15 to 0, -25 to -16, -35 to -26, etc. You may need to adjust the higher temperatures if it doesn’t get as warm in your area.
I made this example for NYC’s climate, and we rarely get quite that cold, so having < 0 was sufficient for me.
Mary Beth
I’m in Minnesota and was wondering the same thing,I believe id I do this I will push the shades of purple up or down and add in shades of teal.
Liza
That’s a good idea! They do get awfully long, so splitting them in half or more could help that.
Christine Ruud
I made one this last year. Would suggest sport weight yarn instead of worsted. It gets large and heavy. I used a single crochet with a drop stitch pattern.
Jennifer E.
How do you figure out how much yarn to purchase?
Elaine H
I’m thinking of doing this but I have one problem: I live in Alaska and if you follow the temps up here you may have noticed that right now we’re experiencing temp of -30*F or lower depending on where you are in the state. So how would I change the temps since it also doesn’t usually get above 80*F in the summer where I live (usually 75*F is hot for us).
Liza
Take your range of temperatures, and take your palette of colors, and create categories for each color within your area’s range.
Pat
What about using the temps from every other day? Then you would end up with about 180 rows without really compromising the temps.
Laura
I’m about to begin one for my husband using the year and location where he was born. I plan to use a thin metallic thread along with the yarn for the day of his birth. Planning on using a single crochet stitch which should be no larger than about 1/2 an inch x 365 – should end up around 5 feet by my calculations.
Lenai Waite
I think I will do mine using an average of every seven days instead of every day. Fifty two rows is a lot easier than 365. I want to do a c2c with row 26 being the start of the decrease rows.