Temperature afghans/blankets are 365 rows of crochet or knitting in which each row represents a daily high or low temperature for a year’s duration. They can represent a calendar year, the first year of an individual, or other occasions.

While deciding many options for this project, I saved ideas on the following Pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/frettybetty/temperature-blanket/

Method
Step 1: Choose colors, yarn weight, yarn brand, and crochet a swatch to ensure all colors compliment each other. Different weather agencies utilize different color schemes in their temperature maps. I chose to use Weather Underground (wunderground.com) colors because I had many of them in my stash.

Caron Simply Soft (worsted weight) Yarn:
100+F - Plum Wine
90-99 F - Burgundy
80-89 F - Autumn Red
70-79 F - Pumpkin
60-69 F - Sunshine
50-59 F - Pistachio
40-49 F - Dark Sage
30-39 F - Country Blue
20-29 F - Dark Country Blue

Step 2: Decide your blanket size, hook size and stitch. The crochet crowd website has a great chart to help with these decisions (http://thecrochetcrowd.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Cha... ). I decided to make a throw with a size H hook using single crochet. I made a foundation chain of 225 stitches using the color yarn needed for 1/1/2017. I also decided to use single crochet. One of the best pieces of advice I read is to choose a stitch that has a low height. This project will have 365 rows. Some complained their blankets were up to 12 feet high. Those who made temperature blankets using single crochet and moss/linen stitches (with worsted weight yarn) reported blanket heights of 6-7 feet.

Step 3: Crochet one row for each day of the year using the colors listed above. The following site is great for retrieving historical weather data if you are unable to record daily highs: https://www.wunderground.com/history/

Step 4: Crochet border.

Results
As the blanket progressed, my stitches got tighter. The beginning of the blanket was 6” wider than the rest. I ripped out the 1st three months and re-stitched them. I added 2 rounds of a green border. Final dimensions: 68” L x 48” W.

Misc.
Daily highs were from central NC. We had a LOOOOONNNNGGGGG, hot summer.