Have you ever made a Temperature Blanket?
I’ve never made one, but at the end of last year BebaBlanket came up with a test for her Mosaic Temperature Blanket. It was launched as a free Cal (Crochet Along) in January and I was happy to test the four patterns she designed for it. Until then, I knew what a temperature blanket was, but I never really dealt with this subject. Through the discussions in her Facebook group I realized how diverse this topic actually can be.
Before I started this test and before I was able to observe the plans of others, my basic knowledge looked something like this:
A temperature blanket is a long-term project over a certain period of time, mostly a whole year. It is made to reflect the temperature curve at a particular location. Typically one row of the blanket stands for one day of the year and a certain color for a certain temperature.
Sounded a bit boring to me….. I think the temperatures in my place are not very interesting. It is not really cold in winter, it is mild in spring and autumn and in the last few years the summers have been just hot. And following one pattern for a whole year? That’s not mine …
Strangely enough, I never thought about the fact that it doesn‘t necessarily have to be my home that the blanket is about. It can just as well be the place of a family member, the place of a dear friend, a favorite holiday destination … just any place somewhere in the world …
And it is similar with the period of time that is considered. It may or may not be the current year. Basically you can use a temperature blanket to record all important times in your life. Or at least most. I searched the internet for the temperature on my day of birth and I didn’t manage to get any dates. Perhaps it’s too long ago. But it shouldn’t be a problem to go twenty or twenty-five years back. Just search for keywords like weather and history and you will get a lot of results.
Seen in this way, a temperature blanket can also be a very personal and unique gift. In one FB-group I read about a lady who was going to make a gift for her son’s 18th birthday. She choose the temperatures form the day of his birth until his first birthday. That is such a lovely idea! Or you can mark a very special day in a special color or a special yarn!
I knew that the temperature curve can be based on the highest, lowest or average temperatures of a day. I also knew that it is recommended to use temperature steps between two and five degrees to assign the colors. But I never thought about combining for instance the highest and lowest temperature or adding details about the weather like sunny, rainy and so on.
Another essential thing I realized when I measured my test swatch and did some maths: for a temperature blanket it can be more important than usual to think about the yarn you want to use. A 365-day blanket, made with DK yarn, will become over 2 meters long. So, if you don’t want to make a queen size blanket you might want to choose a thinner quality.
And just to make the theme complete: The colors are, as always, a matter of taste. A lot of people choose rainbow colors, but meanwhile I’ve seen a lot of color schemes that deviate from it, using only blues, or only reds….. I think there is only one rule: the more colors you chose, the smaller the temperature steps and the more colorful the blanket will be. For a less colorful blanket, simply choose less colors and larger temperature steps.
So many possibilities I never thought about……
As I said, I never planned to make a temperature blanket – and I am still not going to make one. But I I fell in love with the little swatch I made when testing for BebaBlanket. And, as I also like the three other patterns she designed for the blanket, I decided to use up my scrap yarn and follow the pattern for most of the year. I have a lot of yarn from which I have only one ball or even less, so this is a good project to finally use it up. I will show you the details and my progress in one of my next posts.
If I have piqued your interest, you find the pattern here in her Ravelry store.
Hooked on Häkelmaschen 