Temperature Embroidery and Temperature Crochet Blanket

My adventures with Temperature Projects continue! In this post I’ll finally reveal my finished Temperature Embroidery from 2021 AND share my project for 2022 – a Temperature Crochet Blanket. I’ll also be sharing the pattern and method I’m using this year.

I actually finished the Temperature Embroidery just after New Year but I waited a few months before photographing and sharing it.  The extremely long thin shape proved very hard to photograph and not at all Instagram friendly!

I’m delighted with the finished embroidery which fits perfectly on the side of a shelf unit in my Schoolhouse (below left). You can read all about the start of this project in this post. 

The Temperature Embroidery took a starring role at my recent Modern Crewel Embroidery exhibition at The Stitch Festival in London.

This was a very successful but utterly exhausting show! I was so busy that I didn’t manage to take many photos. There will be a forthcoming post all about it which I have written for my publisher C&T’s blog and I did manage a short video tour of the exhibition which should give you a flavour…

Now that I’ve recovered from this event I’ve been catching up on other non-embroidery WIP including my temperature project for 2022, a crochet blanket. I did get this started at the beginning of the year but only managed about 10 days!  I worked out the pattern though and how I was going to join it and luckily I made some notes (otherwise I would have had to start all over again!). And of course I have continued to record the daily temperatures.

I chose a 4-ply 100% alpaca yarn by Drops ‘Drops Alpaca’ as it has a large range of colours and is reasonably priced and easy to obtain in the UK. It’s also incredibly soft and lovely to handle. I ordered 25 shades plus a grey which will be used for the ‘blank days’.

I decided to try a monthly calendar arrangement for this one, making 36 squares for each monthly block. This means there will be at least 5 ‘blank days’ each month to make up the number. These will become a 3 x 4 block blanket.

The crochet square is based on my Temperature Quilt idea of a circle within a square and with the highest temperature for the circle and the lowest being the background. The squares have ended up at 2.75″ each which means the final blanket will be around 50″ x 67″ with some sort of edging.

I worked on this pattern for a while until I got the ratio and size I was happy with. I’m happy to share this pattern with you here for free. But I am only an amateur crochet designer and I have my own way of doing things so please bear with my instructions!  I am joining the squares with a join-as-you-go method using a round of double crochet (single if your are in US) and I have written this out too.

I used a 3mm hook. The instructions are in UK crochet terminology as follows:

ch – chain, dc – double crochet, htr – half treble, tr treble, ss – slip stitch

Temperature Crochet Square

Using highest temperature colour wind yarn around finger to form magic ring.

1. 3ch, 11 tr, ss in 3^rd ch.
2. 3ch, 2 tr in each stitch, change to lowest temperature colour, ss in 3^rd ch.
3. 2ch, 2htr in each stitch, ss in 2^nd ch.
4. 3ch, 1 tr in same st. Working in each following stitch * 1 tr, 3 htr, 3 dc, 3 htr, 1 tr, [2tr, 1ch, 2tr] in next stitch * repeat ** 2 more times, 1tr, 3htr, 3dc, 3htr, 1tr [2tr, 1 ch] in same space as first tr, ss in 3^rd ch.

Fasten off to complete square. Or keep going for the join-as-you-go round as follows:

{1ch, 1dc in ch space, skip first stitch *1 dc in each of next 4 stitches, 1ch and skip a stitch* repeat**, 4 dc,  2 dc in corner ch space, ch } repeat {} round all 4 sides, ss into 1^st ch. The chain spaces in the corners and along the sides are where you will join your square to the next using a chain. You will not work the whole of the JAYG round each time (Only the first square has all 4 sides worked to begin with). Depending on where you are joining the square you will work 1 or 2 sides of the JAYG round prior to joining and the other sides of the round as you join.

If you are not familiar with JAYG then here is a great tutorial from Attic 24 which explains the concept.

And here is January!! We had a freakishly hot day on the 1st which stands out a bit!  I think when I do February I will put the blank days at the beginning of the month so as to spread the grey strips around a bit. As with all of these projects it’s experimental but I like how it looks now and I am enjoying the process.

Now to catch up with mid March!