Last year, I started a temperature blanket on an impulse. It’s been quite a journey from those enthusiastic first stitches to weaving in the last end. My blanket is all done and I’m so excited to finally share the pattern and my experience with you!
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FIND OUT MORE ABOUT MY 2019 TEMPERATURE BLANKET JOURNEY IN THIS VIDEO:
What is a Temperature Blanket?
If you’re new to the concept of a temperature blanket, it’s really easy to understand. You commit to knitting or crocheting a certain number of rows on a blanket based on your local weather. The color of the rows depends on a temperature gauge you create at the beginning of the year. By the end of the year, you have a colorful reminder of all your hard work.
For more details on the basics of temperature blankets, check out this blog post: What’s the Deal With Temperature Blankets?
Making My Perfect Temperature Blanket
The Design
My 2019 Tunisian crochet blanket was designed completely from scratch. I knew I wanted to use the Tunisian simple stitch and I decided on a blanket with multiple panels to keep it from becoming too long.
The design process started with a swatch, which allowed me to estimate the number of stitches and rows I would need for a nice sized throw blanket. All I remember from the hours of planning was a lot of math, a lot of dead erasers, and a few overworked tape measures.
The Yarn
I chose a palette of bright, happy colors from Knit Pick’s Swish DK yarn line. Swish DK is a DK weight 100% superwash wool, available in 39 highly saturated colors. It was easy to choose 9 colors from the palette, which I based around my favorite color (pink), then threw in some warm neutrals. A stripe of white was added to identify the beginning of a new month.
I intentionally chose a DK weight yarn to compensate for the size of my blanket. I also wanted to make sure it wouldn’t be too heavy, as I often get hot under handmade blankets.
The Process
The year started off great with lost of encouragement from my online community. I sailed through the first half of the month, then the project stalled for a bit in the summer and again in late fall. After a few marathon making sessions, I got all caught up again and I weaved in the last end on New Year’s Day, 2020.
My temperature blanket was much more than designing a new pattern for me. It was a periodic escape from the hustle and bustle of being an entrepreneur. Each time I got to make a cup of coffee and crank out a few rows on my project, I got the satisfaction of doing something just for myself.
Tunisian Crochet Temperature Blanket Pattern
YARN: Knit Picks Swish DK. 100% superwash wool, 123 yards per 50g ball. Explore the entire Swish DK yarn line here.
TEMPERATURE GAUGE: I created a temperature gauge based on the average temperatures here in Columbus, Ohio. Your gauge may vary some, but the number of color groups I used is a great way to add plenty of color to your blanket. The gauge below shows each group of degrees and their corresponding color. *All degrees in Fahrenheit.
- 81 and above – Carnation
- 72-80 – Rouge
- 63-71 – Conch
- 54-62 – Clementine
- 45-53 – Allspice
- 36-44 – Honey
- 27-35 – Dove Heather
- 18-26 – Squirrel Heather
- 17 and below – Camel Heather
SUPPLIES: 6mm Tunisian crochet hook with an 8″ cord (try these!), scissors, tapestry needle, locking stitch marker
FINISHED SIZE: Approximately 67″ long x 65″ wide
GAUGE: 16 sts x 15 rows in Tunisian simple stitch
HELPFUL TUTORIAL VIDEOS:
- Tunisian crochet basics
- Color changes in Tunisian crochet
- Joining panels as you go in Tunisian crochet
PATTERN NOTES:
- Carry yarn colors up the sides of work where possible to prevent having to weave in so many ends at the end of your project.
- Tunisian simple stitch has a tendency to curl along the top and bottom edges. I decided to keep the curling in my blanket, but you can relax the curling in your blanket by steam blocking or adding a crochet border.
- Weave in ends at the completion of each panel.
- When it’s time to put your project down for a while, loop a locking stitch marker through the live loop to prevent losing any stitches.
PATTERN DETAILS
Beginning at the bottom left corner of the blanket with the designated color for January 1,
ROW 1: Chain 54, pull up a loop in the 2nd chain from the hook and each remaining chain. Chain 1, (yarn over, pull through the next 2 loops) until there is only one loop left on the hook.
REMAINING ROWS IN THE FIRST PANEL: Tunisian simple stitch for each row. Each day will have 3 rows. Change color as necessary to represent the designated color for each day. At the end of a month, Tunisian simple stitch one row in White. At the end of the panel, complete a slip stitch bind off. Fasten off and weave in all ends.
PANELS 2-5: Using the join as you go method (video tutorial here), chain 53 for the starting chain. The stitch used to connect the new panel to the existing panel counts as a stitch.
Assuming you are crocheting for a year with 365 days, each panel will have the following dates:
- Panel 1: January 1 – March 14
- Panel 2: March 15 – May 26
- Panel 3: May 27 – August 7 (August 7 will only have 2 stripes instead of 3)
- Panel 4: August 8-October 19
- Panel 5: October 20-December 31
Once your blanket is complete, weave in all remaining ends and steam block as necessary.
Let’s Make Together!
Even though I stumbled a bit through my 2019 temperature blanket, I loved the process and I’m pumped to do it again. I have my 2020 blanket planned and my yarn just arrived in the mail! If you’re making a temperature blanket, I invite you to crochet along with hundreds of other makers:
- Use the Hashtag: Use hashtag #CrochetTempBlanket2020 on Instagram to get inspired by other makers and to share your own progress.
- Join the Facebook Group: I share my progress regularly in my Facebook group, TLYC Makers. Feel free to post photos and ask questions in the group.
- Get your Questions Answered: I did a post at the beginning of 2019 that answers some of the most asked questions related to temperature blankets. If you’re still on the fence, read this post and see if that clears things up.
Happy hooking!
xoxo – Toni L.
I love it! I really want to do this, too! Now, since we have a leap year this year… any ideas on modifying this to accommodate? Also, I’m new to Tunisian, but I get bored kinda easily… is there any stitch you could recommend that would give some fun texture, like maybe for row 2 of each day (so simple stitch, new stitch, simple stitch for the three rows)?
Thanks!! -Nikki
Hi Nikki! For the leap year, I’d maybe add a border or even pick colors that match the temp for fun tassels. As for the stitches, I’d still encourage you to keep it simple, but maybe add a bobble for precipitation? Or do a row of Tss, a row of just a few bobbles (maybe one every 6 Tss), then another row of Tss.
Hi my name is Artemise. I have been watching your videos any time I can. Now this Temperature blanket. I think I will give it go. Wish my luck. Keep up the great work. 👍
Good luck! And let me know how it goes 🙂
Hello Toni! I love the temp blanket from last year! I am getting ready to start mine but I have been struggling with the leap year issue. Since it is the last day of the month should I just add it as a row in with the row that separates February and March? I dont want to get to the next panel and have it be uneven.
Thank you, Becca
Hi Becca – I’d stick with the year as is, and maybe use that leap year day as a border.
Hello, Toni your temperature blanket is awesome. I love the colors. I haven’t made one before but your blanket has given me an idea to make one. Love your tutorials.
Hi Amina! Thanks so much for your kind words on my blanket. It was so much fun to make. You can definitely do this!
Hi Toni! I just finished watching your video and reading your blog on the temperature blanket. It is really pretty; love the bright colors! I admire you for admitting to your mistakes and challenges while doing this blanket…thanks for being so “real”! I’ve been tempted a few times, but haven’t taken the plunge for creating a temperature blanket. Your video and blog have rekindled my thoughts and this just might be the year. LOL!
Hi Cathy! Thanks for checking out the video – I loved this project but it definitely isn’t perfect. And that kind of makes me love it even more. A temperature blanket is a big commitment, but so worth it 🙂
Hi Toni – I just watched your video on Youtube and came here to read your blog. Thank you for sharingin your thoughts and ideas. I had never heard of a temperature blanket and I love the idea of it, especially sharing with others how things are going. I will head over to your instagram account and tag along too , if I am not too late to get going on it. (I find I am late to most things! Ha ha)
I especially like your idea of crocheting panels. It gives an additional, very pleasing vertical dimension to the horizontal stripes. You have got me thinking about temperatures and colours now! Thanks
Best wishes from Switzerland
Claire
( @chalcraftdesign on social media )
Hi Claire! It sounds like you’re well on your way to making a stunning temperature blanket this year and I can’t wait to see it! I’m happy to help along the way and I can’t wait to see your progress 🙂
Hi Toni!!! Your pattern calls for a tunisian hook with a cable. I had my eyes on a Furls Tunisian hook, which doesn’t have a cable. Is there a reason for the cable besides just alleviating some of the weight of the project? Would using a long hook like a Furls make it harder to complete? I want a Denise set but I just don’t think I can justify the expense with how much I’m about to spend on the yarn. Your advice is appreciated!!
Hi Kaysie! Great questions. For the temperature blanket, the long Furls hook should work perfectly. Just keep an eye on your wrist to make sure things aren’t getting to heavy. Otherwise, you should be good to go!
Hi Toni – Can you give me an idea on how many skeins of yarn you used for your total project? I’m not very good at math!
Thanks-
Beth
Hi Beth – It’s a little tough to know how much yarn you will use for your project at the beginning of the year, considering that you’ll likely use different amounts of different colors than me. But, overall, I used about 4500 yards of yarn in my project.
I made a Tunisian afghan about 40 years ago, but back then, we called it an Afghan stitch! Fast forward to now, I have bad thumbs, the right one is worse. Do you have any information about crocheting with bad thumbs? I’m afraid the Tunisian stitch may be harder and hurt more than another. Or maybe there’s a size/type needle that had less stress on your thumbs? I hope my needle knife style, not pencil. thanks for any help/tips you can give me.
Hi Kathi – if you have any kind of pain in your hands when you crochet, I’d recommend checking with your doctor before trying anything new. Tunisian crochet is pretty taxing on every part of the hand regardless of the hook, so it might not be a good time to get back into it.
Toni,
I not experienced with Tunisian crochet so can I make this in regular crochet and what stitch would I use. I haven’t even gotten any hooks yet to even try to do the first one and I’m just a beginner in the other one but like the idea so much that I want to try and do this so any help u can give me I would appreciate it
Thanks
Merry
Hi Merry! I’m so happy that you’re excited to make a temperature blanket. You may want to start with this post from one of my blogger friends, which talks more about making a simple temperature blanket in traditional crochet.
I’ve heard of temperature blankets and I love that you have made yours with panels and Tunisian crochet. I’ve also heard of blankets that incorporate both the high and low temperatures of the day. Any idea how to do this?
Hi Renee! Thanks for checking out the post. To incorporate both high and low temperatures, you’ll want to find a pattern that accommodates lots of rows or uses the highs and lows in a unique way. It may take some creative research, but I’m sure there are patterns out there!
You could do the first row as the low, second row as the average third row as the high. More often than not they’d be in the same range, but when they weren’t you’d get thinner stripes
You sure could! You’d just have to worry about weaving in more ends 🙂
If you did it in different ranges, you may have the opportunity to carry the colours more frequently. I’m thinking of doing a pastel/saturated blue and yellow pattern with for month endings because I’m close to the sea. Any ideas?
Is there a way to make the temperature blanket smaller?
I just got my first great granddaughter and would love to make this for her 1st birthday
Sure! You can make the blanket smaller by doing less panels, less stitches per panel, less rows per panel, or any combination of these 🙂
Thanks, Toni, for sharing all your hints and experiences! You have made this project feel much more accessible. I am excited to try making one for my daughter who lives in Africa, to remind her of her New Mexico roots. In order to make the project more portable, I have been wondering about joining the panels at the end of the project. What methods might be best for this? Any cautions or hints?
Hi Andrea! I’m so glad you’ll be making this project for such a special purpose 🙂 My favorite way to join panels is by placing them side by side and whip-stitching them. Use a neutral color (one that shows up a lot in your project). Whip stitching in this way will keep the seam flexible so there is no puckering in your project. Hope that helps!
How many rows are in each panel?
Hi Kathi! There are 219 rows per panel.
Hi Nikki,
I loved your temperature blanket, and your video for learning the Tunisian stitch was so easy to learn from—Thank you. My question is when starting the second panel, what corner am I attaching it to? In other words, does my January 1st row match up with the first day of my second panel? I watched your video about attaching panels but it was confusing to me as far as which corner I should use. I’m a beginner. Thank you so much for being inspirational and making it ok to make mistakes.
Mo
Happy to help, Nikki! You’ll attach to the bottom right-hand corner of your temperature blanket. So, you’re joining to the right-hand side of your January 1st stripe 🙂
Thank you so much!
I just found your channel on youtube per recommendation and am addicted! Wanna watch all your videos, but unfortunately, have to do some home officing 🙁 😀
Also starting to learn from you about tunisian crochet. never knew what it was but looks so pretty! I definitely wann do the blanket, too. But might start next year. I have sooooo many projects I wanna do already… and finding this page of yours makes the list even longer!!!!
Thanks for your inspiration!
I’m so glad that you found me and my tutorials. I’m crazy for crochet and hope I can inspire a future project 🙂
Hi Toni,
I love this blanket! My friends asked me to make them a temperature blanket for their first year of marriage. The only problem with this is they live in Florida. So in an effort to make it have some variety I was originally going to do a simple granny square with each row being the temperature in the coolest part of the morning, at noon(since that is when they got married) and at 7pm at night. After learning tunisian crochet and becoming obsessed! I would love to follow your pattern but I don’t want to make a singular colored blanket either…because Florida. Any idea anyone has would be amazing! I feel like I am totally over thinking this project.
Hi! My best advice is to use a much smaller temperature gauge. I’m in the midwest so my temperature gauge ranges from 30 and below to 95 and above. But in Florida, maybe the gauge will only range from 60 and below to 100 and above. Then put 8-10 groups within that range. Your group may only have 2 or 3 degrees in them, but it’ll give you a chance to use lots of color.
Love love this blanket. I recently learned Tunisian and I was looking at this blanket for my temp blanket 2021. I live in South Florida so I was able to adjust the temp gauge to be from the high 90s to the low 50s (4 degrees per color).
Can you give any idea of how much, in total, yarn you used? I’m looking to do this retroactively for 2020 and need to buy yarn. I know my proportions of colors will be different, but just wondering about the total yardage/balls used.
Thanks!
Never mind. I see you’ve already answered this in another comment. Sorry, I didn’t see that at first.
How many stitches did u start with
Hi! Details are in the pattern.
Hi Toni, I love your channel. Thanks for the introduction to Tunisian crochet. I am getting things together to make your Tunisian weather blanket. However, I have a question about the pattern that I don’t quite understand: REMAINING ROWS IN THE FIRST PANEL: Tunisian simple stitch for each row. Each day will have 3 rows. How does each day have 3 rows? Thank you in advance for your help. Lisa
Hi! You’ll work 3 rows of Simple Stitch in the same color for each day. So day 1 is 3 rows of the same color, Day 2 is 3 rows of that day’s color and so on.
Hello, love this one and all the great help and suggestions.
Since temperature blanket is daily color changes, have you ever thought of a tunisian panel(s) blanket based on bright east coast colors,or soft southern/central colors, or warm midwest colors or or cool pacific coast colors?
Each panel could be one palette color and joined to next panel per instructional videos.your color combinations are very beautiful and helpful.
Thank you for beautiful patterns and videos, your blogs are wonderful and looked forward to.
Hi Toni!
I made a temperature blanket for a friend who got married, after watching your video on it and doing a lot of research, about a year ago and they LOVED the blanket. I’m pregnant and didn’t want to do a traditional crocheted blanket so I wanted to try a tunisian crocheted blanket, but I was wondering how you did the math to get the size your blanket is? (I hope that made sense. Also, I made the pilson blanket with left over yarn from the temperature blanket and my husband loves the pattern and wants a bigger version for himself!). Thank you for all the tutorials and instagram posts — I learned how to tunisian crochet and how to do a temperature blanket from you!
Hi! Great question 🙂 I had an idea of how big I wanted my blanket to be, and how many columns I wanted to have. From there, I made a gauge swatch and estimated how many rows I would need in each column (for the length) and the number of stitches for each column (for the width). It definitely takes some time, but you can gather a lot of information from your gauge swatch.
How many rows per color and how many rows per color for southeast Texas?
We have about 1 month of chilly weather (about40f) 5 months of 40-65 and 5 months of 80-100 .
1 month allowance for iffiness
I wouldn’t adjust the pattern at all for your location, if that’s what you’re asking.
Hi there! Love this idea and am going to do this for 2022 but have a question on color substitutions! it looks like Rouge, Camel Heather, and Carnation are no longer made..would you have any suggestions as to what to use as a substitution? Thank you!!
Hi! Bummer those colors aren’t available. I’d try to swap them in for something similar or go with a few neutral colors.
Hi Toni, getting my yarn together now for this temperature blanket (Tunisian Crochet) Forgot to ask you the last time I posted a question. I am a leftie, so when starting my second panel, do I also start on the right side? I am not sure which side is the correct side to start the new panel left or right. Thank you in advance for your help.
Hi! Great question. You’ll be working your panels from right to left. So your second panel will connect to the left side of the previous panel.
Hi! I am a total self taught newbie. I know how to start a chain and single crochet – which I think is the linen stitch? Can I follow this pattern with that stitch? If so, would I make all the panels and then stitch them together? I did go to the link you mentioned in another comment with the basic linen stitch blanket. Maybe that’s the way to go for my first?
Thanks!
I’ve talked about doing a temperature blanket for years but I’m doing it this year – 2022! I found your videos and instantly fell in love with the Tunisian stitch. I’ve never done it before so super excited to try it. Plan to practice the stitch for a bit before I jump into the blanket. I’m following your pattern with the panels just adjusting the colors but also in the mid-west. Thank you so much for sharing!
You’ve got this! I just know your blanket will be beautiful. Stop by if you need any help 🙂