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Temperature Blanket – Take 2!

July 11, 2016 By: Deena Price7 Comments

You may have noticed that I haven’t posted about my temperature blanket for quite some time…I got behind and then I just couldn’t force myself to pick it back up.  I found that I just wasn’t loving the pattern like I thought I would.  For a project that I am going to work on for an entire year, loving the pattern is essential!  So, I took even some more time off from the project and then I saw another another person that had the same problem as me and she picked a pattern that she loved and just made it work! So that became my solution too!

One of my favorite patterns right now is called a Corner to Corner blanket or C2C.  I figured out how big I wanted my blanket to be, adjusted my original colors, adjusted all of my temperature ranges and now I am in love with the results!

I would like my blanket to end up being a throw blanket just about the right size to lay under while I’m sitting on the couch.  Here is how I decided to do it:

The C2C blanket consists of clusters of stitches. I decided that I needed my blanket to be 72 clusters by 102 clusters.  That gives me a total of 7344 clusters.  I am stitching 20 clusters in the color of the day each day.  There will be 24 extra stitches that I need to round out my blanket so I added an extra stitch in each color until I had achieved the 24 stitches.

So far I have completed both January and February and I am loving the results! Now I just need more time to crochet so I can get caught up to the present day!

Here is the result from January 1st through January 31st!Temp Blanket 1-1 through 1-31

Here is the results from January 1st through February 29th! I really love how you can see the temperatures warming up but every once in awhile a cool day slips in there!Temp Blanket 1-1 through 2-29

If you would like to make your own C2C blanket, here is the link that I used to learn how to make this blanket – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNrS4s5C8vc

Temperature Blanket – Week 5

February 7, 2016 By: Deena Pricecomment

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Week 5 was a great week for my Temperature Blanket! I got to add the special block for February – a heart and I got to start my 3rd row!

I found my heart pattern here – Heart Pattern I made the size C, large heart pattern. I used Caron Simply Soft Sparkle in Red Sparkle.

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I was excited to start my 3rd row! My temperature blanket is starting to look more like a blanket and less like a few squares stitched together!

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I have collected a few sparkly yarn and some varigated yarn for all my special blocks!  I found a basket in a smaller size that matches all the yarn for my temperature blanket. In 2 weeks, I get to add a block for Valentine’s Day and 2 family birthdays!

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Temperature Blanket – Week 4

February 4, 2016 By: Deena Pricecomment

My temerature blanket is really starting to take shape and have some fun colors in it! We have been having some unseasonable warm temperatures in January this year and you can really see that with some of the bright green blocks!

You can see that I finally got my new #1 sewed on.  I definitely like it much better than the straight line for a one.

Temp Blanket Week 4

I tried folding my blanket to get a better picture.  you can still see all the colorful blocks but it was way easier to get a good picture this way! I am excied for next week…I get to add a heart for February!

Temperature Blanket – Week 2 & 3

February 3, 2016 By: Deena Pricecomment

Temp Blanket Week 2

In week 2, my blanket is getting longer and it’s getting harder to take a picture! I laid it out on my dinning room table but I couldn’t get high enough to get a picture straight on so it is kind of crooked! I was very excited to add my Blue Mint color!

Temp Blanket Week 3

For week 3, I switched my blanket to my floor but accidentally got my toes in the picture! You can see that I have taken off my #1 in the 3rd block and I hadn’t sewn it back on yet because I wanted to get to the craft store and purchase the clear thread.  I was excited to start on my 2nd row.  The blanket will be 416 squares which is 18 squares wide by 22 squares long…

How I have my blanket planned out is that the “Month Block” (like the snowflake for January) will be at the very beginning of the month but any “Holiday Block” (like my #1 for New Years Day) will be the block after the temperature block for the day.  So the first block is my January block, the 2nd block is the temperature for January 1st, the 3rd block is the #1 for the special block for New Years day.

Please feel free to message me with any questions!

Temperature Blanket Pattern and Week 1 Completed!

February 3, 2016 By: Deena Pricecomment

I tried out quite a few patterns before I settled on the pattern that I liked the most for my temperature blanket…it needed to be a pattern that I would still like doing a year from now! Also, I wanted to pick a pattern that would be easy to add my decorative blocks too.

I chose the following pattern from spincushions.com – Squaring The Circle

Each block is a colored circle with a white edging that squares the block.  The color of the inner circle represents the HIGH temperature for each day of 2016!  I used Caron Simply Soft Yarn and a size H hook.  Each block is 4 1/4 by 4 1/4 inches.

Temperature Blanket - One Block

I chose a snowflake pattern to be the block that represented January.  I found the pattern online and posted as a PDF

Snowflake for January

I used a size 2 sparkly silver yarn with a size F hook to acheive the size of snowflake that I wanted.  The block for the month will be placed at the begining of the month before any temperature blocks are placed.  I made the square block with all white yarn and made the snowflake seperately.  I am using Coats brand transparent thread to sew all of the holiday designs on to the blocks.

Temp Blanket January Block - Snowflake

For the New Years Day holiday, I chose to represent that block with the #1.  I found a great video tutorial on youtube  – Tutorial for #1

#1

With my January (snowflake) block done and my New Years Day (#1) block done, I then crocheted the first 7 blocks with their coordinating temperatures!

Temp Blanket Week 1

I am LOVING how it is starting out! As you can see in this picture the #1 is differnt.  This was the first #1 that I did, and I didn’t like how it looked, so I took it off and crocheted the pink #1!

2016 Temperature Blanket – The Planning Stages

February 3, 2016 By: Deena Pricecomment

I first heard about Temperature Blankets on December 30th of 2015.  At first I thought it was a crazy idea but then I was intrigued. So, I joined a group on FaceBook and got started planning my own Temperature Blanket.  My color choices have gone through quite a few iterations but I am finally satisfied with the colors I have and I believe they will give a good representation of the temperatures that we have here in South East Washington!  Because we live in the desert, our temperatures range from the negatives to well over 100 deg. each year!

I am using Caron Simply Soft yarn to crochet by blanket and I have decided to make squares and join them.  I decided this for 2 reasons…I felt I could better control the size of my blanket by planning my squares out ahead of time and it will only take me 15 mintues a day to make and join each square instead of doing a long stripe each day. Also, I rarely make blankets that I have to join so I thought this would give me some good practice throughout the year!

So, I started by planning my color choices and these are what I ended up with:

Temp Blanket Color Chart

*I found this cute basket to hold all of my yarn!

Pic of Temp Blanket Yarn (2).

For my yarn that denotes our cooler temperatures, I placed the yarn in a dark to light gradiation (for grey, purples and blues) then when we get to the colors that denote our warmer temperatures, I laid the colors out in a light to dark gradiation (greens, pinks, yellows, oranges and reds).  By doing it this way, I believe the colors better represent the true temperatures that they portray.

The next stage of my planning was figuring out how I wanted my blanket squares to be laid out.   You can see how I chose to lay my blanket out by clicking the link below.  I will have 416 squares when my blanket is complete.  I chose to do one square for each day of the year, 1 square to denote the begining of each month, one square for each of our families birthdays and I included a square for quite a few of our holidays.

Temperature Blanket Template

I am tracking the weather at www.acuweather.com and I am recording it in an Excel spreadsheet that I created.

Spider Web Beanie Crocheted Hat

September 15, 2014 By: Deena Pricecomment

 

My little guy who is 2 1/2 is obsessed with Spiderman!  He loves Spiderman so much that there are days he wants to be called Spiderman!  So when I found a pattern for a crocheted Spider Web hat, I had to make it for him!

 

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I found the pattern and idea here.  She found the idea here.  This originally was made as a Halloween spiderweb hat.  This is such an easy pattern that I may make some Halloween hats as well!

I made mine just like on My Hobby is Crochet website.  I followed her directions for the cuff.  Like her, I opted for a ribbed cuff.  I added 3 rows of front post and back post double crochets.

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I love how this hat turned out and my little guy loves it so much he wears it more than anything else I have made him!

How Do You Get Those Holes in the Blankets to Crochet Into???

September 6, 2014 By: Deena Price1 Comment

Well…that is the question I get asked most often.

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So what are those holes and how do they get there and why are they so important?  To be able to crochet nicely around a flannel blanket it is very important to have evenly spaced holes that stay open.  There are a few different ways to do this. Some people use an awl to punch their own holes.  I have not tried this method because I don’t believe I would get the evenness that I want and there is no stitch keeping the holes open.  I have also seen products that are supposed to help you line up the holes so that you can punch them evenly.  If you do a web search you will find lots of ideas on how to make the holes, but for me they all had one problem – due to the nature of flannel fabric, the holes do not easily stay open.  I found instructions online for using a wing needle in your sewing machine to make the holes.  This solved the problem of evenly spaced holes but because our sewing machines only have one needle, it does not stitch the hole open.

While I was looking online for a solution to my problem, I was fortunate to run across the website – www.heirloomhemstitching.com.  It was the solution I had been looking for!  Julie has a hemstitching machine that makes the holes that I needed to have a nicely completed project!  So for about 6 years now, I have been buying my fabric and sending it to Arizona!  I do not receive any compensation for promoting Julie’s site but I have always been happy with the work that she has done and the speed that she can do it in!

hemstitching machine

If you look around on Julie’s site, she tells all about the hemstitching machine and how it works.  She also has her pricing list posted.

So here’s how it works for me…I buy flannel when it is on sale and I mail it to Julie.  I buy 2 pieces of coordinating fabric that measure 1 yard each for each blanket and burp cloth set.  Out of that fabric, I get one small baby blanket and 2 burp cloths.  If you don’t want the burp cloths you can opt for 1 larger blanket.

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She uses her magic (and her hemstitching machine) to turn my fabric into crochet-able blankets and burp cloths!  I receive them back like the picture below.  you can see that there is a salvage edge around the burp cloth.  The close up picture below shows how her machine works to both punch the holes and sew them open at the same time!

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After I receive my fabric, I trip the salvage edge off.  I only leave about 1/4 of an inch of fabric.  Trim slowly and carefully.  If you cut into the hemstitching you can ruin your blanket.

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All that is left to do now is to pick a crochet thread, pick a pattern and get to work!  For this project I picked a variegated yellow crochet thread.  It is the Omega brand 100% nylon thread.  I chose to use the Basic Shell Crochet Edge Pattern that you can find on my site!  Good luck and happy stitching.

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Rag Quilt With Minky Fabric Tutorial

September 4, 2014 By: Deena Price2 Comments

 

Rag Quilt top photo

I have always loved the look of Rag Quilts!  My mom is a quilter.  I am not nearly as talented as her, but I do love to make baby quilts!  My husband and I have been doing foster care for 4 years.  We started taking infants 2 1/2 years ago and so I decided I needed some baby blankets, not just my crocheted baby afghans.  So I bought some neutral fabric that I loved and got to work!

The traditional rag quilt is made with flannel fabric for both the front and back of the quilt with batting in the center but I wanted something different.  I found my inspiration here!  So I used Calico fabric for the front, flannel fabric instead of batting and Minky fabric for the back.

Materials:

  • Approximately 2 yards of fabric – I used Calico prints from Joann’s Fabric store
  • 1 yard of batting or 1 yard of flannel – I used brown flannel
  • 1 yard of backing material – I used Minky fabric
  • Cutting mat and rotary cutter
  • Coordinating thread
  • Sharp scissors – I love my Tim Holtz Scissors – Tim Holtz Kushgrip – Micro Serrated Snips

Directions:

Cut all your fabric for the front of your baby quilt into squares.  You can do any size square.  In this quilt, I used 4×4 inch squares.

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You will also need to cut all the fabric for the back of your quilt.  You will also make these squares the same size as the pieces you cut for the front of your quilt.  I use a cutting mat, rotary cutter and ruler to make this process quick and easy!  The handle that you see on my ruler is actually a suction handle for a shower or bath.  Using it makes picking your ruler up without moving your material so much easier.  You can purchase them on Amazon  – here: Mommy’s Helper Safer Grip 11.5″

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The last step for cutting your material is your filler or center piece.  On a traditional rag quilt, you would use a thin batting and cut it 1″ smaller than your material.  So if my material was cut into 4″ squares then my batting would be cut into 3″ squares.  But because I am not using flannel for my top or bottom pieces, I need flannel for my center pieces so that it will “shred” and look like a rag quilt.  If you use flannel for your filler, then you cut it the same size as your other fabric pieces.

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It is hard to see on the next picture, but you then layer your fabric with the flannel sandwiched in the middle.  The right side of your fabric needs to face out for both your top and bottom layers.

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To save time you can use an assembly line process to sew your blocks together.  You sew two diagonal lines on each block to form an X.  Sew all of your blocks before moving on to the next step.

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Once you have all of your X’s sewn on your blocks, lay them out and decide how you want your quilt to look.  You can use as little as 2 different types of fabric.  I used 7 in my quilt because I wanted more of a scrappy look to my blanket.

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Once you have your pattern laid out, sew your pieces together in order to make rows.  I used a 1/2″ seem in my quilt.  You can use as little as 1/2″ seem up to a 1″ seem.  The larger your seem is, the more “raggy” your quilt will look.  Once your rows are complete, start sewing them together to complete your quilt top.  After you have completed sewing all your rows together you need to sew all the way around the outside of the quilt.  Use the same seem allowance.

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Here are pictures of the back and front of my completed quilt…only one more step to go – get your scissors out and start snipping!

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This part of the quilt will go much faster if you have a nice sharp set of scissors.  I really like using my Tim Holtz scissors for this.  They are mildly serrated, so they cut great!  Make sure NOT to cut too deep on your fabric.  you don’t want to cut any of your seems you just sewed.  The last step is to wash and dry your new baby blanket.  When you wash it, the flannel part of the fabric will start to fray and give you the “rag” look!

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Here is my completed baby quilt – I LOVE how it turned out!  Please feel free to email me with any questions – Happy Quilting!

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Cathedral Edge Crochet Pattern

June 18, 2009 By: Deena Price3 Comments

6a0112791a72d428a401157032e3b3970c

Cathedral Edge Pattern –
Row #1 – SC all the way around the blanket, SS to join
Row #2 – *SC in the first stitch, skip 2 stitches, work 4 TR in the next stitch, CH 3, SC in the top of the last TR to form a bump in the same stitch as the previous TR, work 4 more TR, skip 2 stitches**  Repeat from *to**.  Repeat around the blanket, placing SC in the corners, join with a SS to first SC
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I love using this pattern for this dinosaur material.  The pattern reminds me of the spikes of a dinosaur!
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About Me

I am a stay-at-home-mom of 12 wonderful kids! My two oldest sons live on their own. And my 10 youngest (ages, 3, 4, 4, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 17 & 18) live at home! We have been fortunate enough to be foster parents for the last 5 years. We have adopted 7 kiddos out of foster care and currently have one foster daughter - life is crazy and busy, but we LOVE it! I have been crafting for about 20 years. I started with stamping and crocheting and my hobby has grown from there! I always say, "I haven't met a craft I didn't like!" At this time, I spend the majority of my craft time crocheting because I can crochet in the family room while the kids play! Although I am an extremely busy mom, I spend my evenings creating! I love to make gifts for my family and friends. Feel free to leave a comment and tell me what you like or what you don't like or what you would like to see more of!

Deena

Tags

2016 afghan alphabet altered baby baby blanket bagalope basket blanket burp cloth C2C caron cakes caron simply soft Corner to Corner craft crochet crocheting decoupage Easter edge envelope flannel flower gift minky organization pattern prima quilt rag ruffle border scallop border scrapbook scrapbooking space sparkle spiderman teacher temperature Temperature Blanket tutorial wash cloth wood wooden yarn

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