True story: The only temperature blanket I ever completed was one that I scrapped in crocheting, and ended up sewing as a quilt instead. It was a first birthday/first year gift for a lovely little girl, and gets loads of love, just the way it is supposed to be.

Quick - What's a Temperature Blanket?

Temperature blankets track the daily temperature typically by each row representing a day, and the color being determined by the creator's color scale.

So, if January 1st has a temperature of 10 degrees, you'd crochet or knit one row of light blue, or whatever color you've chosen for that temperature range.

There are lots of interesting ways to do this and I love/hate when people ask the 'right way' or how they are 'supposed to handle this' - the fun part is making it your own! I stick with the daily high temperature from my home zip code, since it's easy to go back and track when I get lazy and skip a day or two or several months. You can do the highs, lows, average. You can track temperature when and where you travel, to have a visual remembrance of that built into your finished piece. You can make your scale go by 2 degrees or 20 degrees. Whatever works for you! Also, you do not (say it louder) have to do a rainbow scale. There's obviously nothing wrong with rainbows, but there are so many beautiful colorways that will make a gorgeous and unique temperature blanket and might even match your home's aesthetic better.

Or, you can semi-cheat like me, wait most of the year, and then play with your colors and scale break points to work out a nice spread of colors in your pattern. It's only semi-cheating, because it's still using the scale and calendar in linear/chronological order. Right? Not cheating?

Temperature Blanket Template - Grab Your Copy!

I created this template in Google Sheets to help me track my first (ok, first several) attempts! Does anyone want a starter that goes to about February 10th? I spent some time finessing the function and format of this Sheet, and found that these refinements made my life a lot easier. Since the work is already done, sharing is caring! I'd love for this to be as helpful to you as it has been to me - so feel free to grab your copy.

This is perfect for someone like me because it's a good system, but it's also very visual. Here's how it works:

Once you've got your ranges set up, all you have to do is type in the number of the day's temperature, and your cell will automatically change to that background color. It makes it really easy to glance at what your row should be, as well as what your overall progress looks like. You can also check off your rows as you do them, so when you're 12 days into that 90 degree hot streak, you don't lose your place.

What happens when you click the button?

Simple - a Google Sheet will open in a new tab and ask you if you want to make a copy - Click the blue 'Make A Copy' button and it will get added to your Google Drive without changing the original, and allowing anyone else to make their own copy! You'll then be free to make your own changes to your own copy as you wish. Enjoy!

Some Notes on the Template

For ease, there are some quick notes in the template itself, so they'll always be in front of you! But here are some notes in a bit more detail:

• There are two tabs - one for rows, one for a grid - rows are more common in temperature blankets, especially knitting and crocheting.
• The grid pattern is 16 x 23 which is the closest 'normal' rectangle I could get close to a year's worth of squares. This comes out to 368 squares - you can repeat the first/last few days, you can add in bonuses for holidays or birthdays, you can wait for a leap year and have less extra, whatever you want!
• To change your colors and range, you'll have to go into Format>Conditonal Formatting. You can't just change it on the first page - but once you've got it set up properly, it will make managing your project way easier! Set your custom colors, and then create/change your date ranges and color formats in the conditional formatting settings.