Knitted Temperature Blanket [Free Pattern]

My blog has been fairly quiet for a while, and one reason for that is because I recently finished my PhD in psychology! One part of our journey was a year-long internship in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. I decided to document my year there by making a temperature blanket. That means that you knit one row per day with a colour corresponding to the temperature outside. I had seen some finished blankets online, but actually had a hard time finding a good pattern, so I made up my own that I am going to share with you. Here are some of my tips!

Creating a Legend:
The first thing you need to do is create a legend. You can follow mine, but it might not be a good fit if you live in a warmer climate, or even another part of Canada. I would suggest making your own legend, or following one from Pinterest if you aren't into math.

First you need to choose the number of colours that you want to use (I used 9). I recommend using multiple shades of the same colour, and throwing in some neutral shades as well. I have seen some that are rainbow colours, but they are a little bright for me. I used reds, blues, and browns.

Next, you need to get a sense of what the range of temperatures will be for your location. If you go to the weather network you can find their monthly forecast page that will give you past weather data.

If you are in Canada, you can also look at this Government of Canada website to get an idea.

For my legend, I had -45'C as the extreme cold temperature, and 35'C as the extreme high temperature. I wanted the colour to change at 0' so I modified things that way. I only ended up having 1 day of -37 and colder, and I ended up having a couple days of +37 that I hadn't included in my legend, so I re-used another colour.

Take the extreme temperatures and subtract them to get the total number of degrees in your range.
E.g. 35 - (-45) = 80

Then divide that number by the number of colours you want to use.
E.g. 80 / 9 = 8 (ish)

Then make your legend, using a range of that number of degrees (8) for each colour. I also decided to add a second strand of lighter white yarn on days that it snowed. Here is how my legend turned out:

You should buy 2 balls of each colour, just in case. I only bought one ball of each colour, but ended up running out of a few colours. Unfortunately Michael's had discontinued the exact colour that I needed so I had to find a replacement. It ended up not being very noticeable because you are changing colours so often.

I recommend making a chart where you can write down the temperature/colour for each day and check it off. If you're anything like me, you may not be able to knit every single day and may need to do some catching up. I just had a little notebook and made a chart by hand.

I used the exact temperatures from the website above, and knit the row a day behind. I used the measured temperatures, not the windchill or humidex temperatures. I used the following temperatures:

Fall: Daily Average
Winter: Daily Low
Spring: Daily Average
Summer: Daily High




Now you're ready to knit! Here's how:

Materials: 
6mm (US 10) circular needle
Approximately 18 balls of worsted weight yarn (I used Impeccable from Michael's) Note: you will have yarn leftover, but buy at least 2 balls per colour

Directions: 
Cast on 167 stitches

Knit garter stitch (knit every row) across. Knit one row per day for a total of 365 rows.

Cast off and sew in all the ends.

Finished size is approximately 46" x 64".

Versatile Chili Recipe

One of the things that I love most about cooking is how versatile and creative you can be. If you don't have a certain ingredient, you can just leave it out and usually your recipe will turn out OK. In this post, you can take any of the ingredients from each of the categories and combine them to make any time of chili you please. I would say that a given would be to always use crushed tomatoes or tomato paste, but you can do meatless chili, or carbless chili (no filler), or vegetable-less chili. I have included some sample recipes at the bottom, and two different cooking methods (stovetop or crock pot). I love making chili because it can be relatively healthy, it's super easy to make, and it freezes really nicely. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

Tomatoes
- canned crushed tomatoes or tomato paste
- canned or fresh diced tomatoes

Meat
- ground beef
- ground turkey or chicken
- none

Filler
- beans (black, kidney, red, lima)
- chick peas
- tempeh (fermented soy patty similar to tofu)
- quinoa (pre-cooked)
- rice (pre-cooked)

Vegetables
- mushrooms
- peppers (green, red, yellow, hot)
- onions (cooking)
- carrots
- celery
- eggplant
- zucchini

Spices
- salt
- pepper
- chili powder
- basil
- cumin
- bay leaf (don't eat it)
- oregano
- onion salt
- celery salt
- garlic powder
- hot sauce

How to Cook:

Stovetop Method:

1. Brown the meat with a little bit of oil in a large pot until it is fully cooked over medium heat.
2. Add the remaining ingredients and stir.
3. Simmer over medium heat until the veggies are tender (approx. 20-30 minutes).

Crock Pot Method:

1. Brown the meat with a little bit of oil in a frying pan until it is fully cooked over medium heat.
2. Add all the ingredients, including the meat, into a crock pot and stir.
3. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.

Sample Recipes:

Jenna's Favourite Chili
- 2 packages ground turkey or chicken
- 1 can diced tomatoes
- 1 can crushed tomatoes
- 1 can black beans
- 1 package sliced mushrooms
- 1 green pepper
- 1 red pepper
- 1 onion
- 1 cup diced carrots
- 1 cup diced celery
- salt
- pepper
- chili powder
- basil
- cumin
- bay leaf
- oregano
- garlic powder

Classic Chili
- crushed tomatoes
- ground beef
- beans
- mushrooms
- onions
- chili powder

Vegetarian Chili
- crushed tomatoes
- diced tomatoes
- beans
- quinoa
- tons of veggies
- spices

Healthy Carb-Free Chili
- crushed tomatoes
- diced tomatoes
- ground turkey or chicken
- tempeh
- tons of veggies
- spices

Winter Headband with a Twist (Knit)

I saw someone walking down the street with a headband similar to this, and decided to make one for myself. The pattern is pretty simple, don't be put off by the single cable. I posted a picture tutorial for cabling under my last headband pattern, which you can find here. The knit 1 purl 1 ribbing on this piece makes it a bit thicker, and helps keep it flat instead of curling at the edges. Hope you enjoy the pattern! 

Materials

Worsted weight yarn

Size 8 (5mm) needles, and a spare needle

Cast on 20 stitches

Work knit 1 purl 1 ribbing until half the length of the diameter of your head (approx. 9").

Put the first 10 stitches on a spare needle and hold them to the front of your work.  K1 P1 to end of the row. Put the first 10 stitches back onto the needle, and then K1 P1 to end of row. 

Work knit 1 purl 1 ribbing until desired length. Cast off stitches, and sew the two ends together, and weave in yarns ends. 

Finished size: approx. 18" x 3"

What the piece looks like before being sewn together