After knitting a temperature scarf in 2018, I wanted to do another one. But I didn’t need another 18 foot scarf. Design choices were made and that is another story.
I started a tatted one in 2019. The benefits of tatting a scarf were that I could do a motif a day and show both the high temperature and low temperature of the day, as well as days when we had a half inch or more of rain or more than a trace of snow or ice.
Based on the information from my previous scarf I settled on 5-degree temperature bands and selected thread colors in size 20 Lizbeth and blue beads for rain and white beads for snow/ice. Then I looked at what thread colors I had on hand and adjusted my selection. This is why the same thread color represents two difference bands; two different dye lots with just enough difference.
I kept a notebook and used weatherunderground to track highs, lows, and make sure I noted which colors I would be using and whether beads would be involved; as it turns out, I did not use any white beads at all. I also selected multicolor or ombre threads to represent each month; for example, January has a hand dyed thread called “Winter Sky” that’s blue and grey. Those motifs filled in the month in the first and last week to make sure the row was seven motifs across, as well as helped me track which block was which month.
Once all 12 months were completed, I added a band of split rings in black to join them together. After they were one long band, I tatted a black chain around the outside to unify them and then a coral one, as Pantone’s color of the year in 2019 was a shade of coral.
Bonus, once I finished it in 2022, I entered it into my State Fair competition, Clothing, Accessories-Other and won a blue ribbon. Amusingly, this was during a span of time crochet and knit items had to have a swatch included as proof it was made by the entrant. The volunteer accepting my scarf asked the other volunteers, tentatively, “Do we need a swatch for this?” And technically I did have one. I had done a strip of seven motifs to get an idea of the scarf’s final size. I just wasn’t sure what I had done it.
Scarf on display at 2026 IOLI conference
Scarf on display at 2023 Palmetto Tat Days
Trying to capture the entire 6 feet of scarf
*Close up of January, as the 2nd row of chains was started. The pink & green motif on the left was January 1st. Note the high temperature of January 2nd was about the same as the low on the 1st. *
A day with rain
December, read left to right, note that the only day with a half inch or more of rain was December 14th
Page from the notebook I used to track temperatures, colors, and beads, as well as rows and month color.