My completed crochet Sky Blanket

I'm thrilled to announce that my Sky Blanket 2016 is finally complete! It's been a long project but I've loved completing it and I'm so pleased with my lovely, enormous, snuggly blanket.

The final blanket measures 144cm in width (with a starting chain of 200 plus border) and 337cm in length including the border. The border is four rows wide, with half trebles down the sides and double crochet across the top and bottom, so the side border is very slightly wider. The blanket is mainly crocheted in half trebles, with the occasional row of trebles or mixed stitches.

Obviously the colours of yarn that you will need for a project like this will vary greatly depending on where in the world you live and the rules that you use for your blanket. I chose to stick with natural sky colours, and to add embellishments to represent special days and sky colours. This is the colour breakdown that I had for my typical year in the UK:

White (for snow and fog) - 5
Light blue - 125
Medium blue - 67
Light grey - 142
Dark grey - 23
Mixed colours - 4 = 366 rows (2016 was a leap year)

For the blanket I used Red Heart Detroit yarn which comes in 100g balls. I found that one ball allowed me to complete around 15 rows of half trebles. So I did get through quite a bit of yarn! I ended up with more grey rows than I was expecting, although looking at the colour breakdown there were more blue sky days overall. Of course the weather here is so mixed that on many days I could have used any of these colours in my blanket!

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December, and here's how it looked as it went along:

If you are interested in making your own Sky Blanket, I have written several posts which might help. I've shared some tips on completing a Sky Blanket, and what I would do differently next time. I have also included the blanket as a project on Ravelry, where you can find links to all my blog posts and progress pictures - Crochet Sky Blanket.

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

With thanks to Make it Coats for providing me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in December #SkyBlanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

The year is over, and along with it my Sky Blanket project has come to an end! Well, technically, the blanket is not complete yet, as I still have to crochet the border. But the daily rows are all done, and I'm hoping to call the blanket finished within the next few weeks.

Here is how my blanket has progressed so far - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October and November - and here is how the blanket looked with the daily rows finished at the end of December.

It's a bit easier to see the blanket from the front, and as you can see it is enormous! It measures over 3 metres in length, and I concur that it is a rather ridiculous size for a blanket. But once I set myself to a challenge I like to see it through, and I just couldn't bear to stop, or change anything to make it smaller. I have written a blog post about things that I would do differently next time, chief amongst them being to find a way to make it smaller, but I do love it and I can't wait until the border is finished and I can snuggle underneath it properly.

For the border I'm going to use this yarn from Red Heart. I received it from Make it Coats along with the other yarn that I used for the blanket, but I didn't use it for any of the daily rows as it was quite similar to the colour that I used for medium blue. So it doesn't duplicate the colours and I think that it is complementary to the coloured stripes. I'm not sure how wide the border will be yet, I'm thinking about making it wider down the sides to even it out a bit, but there is going to be a lot of crochet involved so I might just decide that I want to get it finished!

I filmed my Sky Blanket at the beginning of December as part of Vlogmas 2016, and you can see the video here, although not quite complete it gives a good impression of the size of the blanket!

Here's a collage of the progress throughout the year. It seemed to take ages to get going but it built up very quickly, and by about the end of June it was definitely a decent blanket size. Perhaps a six month sky blanket project would be an idea for next time!

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

Tips for completing a crochet Sky Blanket

You can see my completed Sky Blanket here - My crochet Sky Blanket

As a new year starts, my Sky Blanket 2016 project draws to a close. This crochet blanket has kept me busy for the entire year, and even though it's up to date in terms of rows there is still plenty to get done, with a large border to complete. If you are starting a similar project this year, I thought I'd share a few tips to help with the planning and to keep you on track.

* When making a start on the blanket, you need to remember that it could end up being very large when it is completed. If you are planning to knit or crochet a row a day it will be huge. Working smaller squares and sewing them together will make a more manageable blanket.

* The blanket will also use a lot of yarn. I estimated that a 100g ball of yarn would crochet approximately 17 rows of half trebles on my 200 chain blanket. So for 366 (leap year) rows that's more than 21 big 100g balls, and of course it's unlikely to be an even spread across the colours so you'll need to allow more for some colours (here in the UK that's realistically going to be extra grey). Try to choose a yarn that will still be available if you need to purchase more as you go along.

* It's a long project and you can always make changes as you go along - I intended to just keep to the same stitch throughout the blanket but a couple of months in I decided to mix it up a bit with a few different stitches to keep it interesting and I'm so glad that I did.

* Don't be too ambitious and give yourself too much to do each day, it's better to have a completed smaller blanket than an unfinished one lying around. This is especially important if you are going to be away for a while or there will be periods of time when you won't be able to work on it and you'll have to catch up.

* If you are planning on travelling or being away from home a lot, think about keeping the project portable my making squares etc. - by around April I found that the blanket was becoming far too big to be packing to take away with me and so I had to catch up when I got back.

* Sew in all the ends as you go along, otherwise it will be a daunting task!

* Keep a record of the sky colour each day, whether written or photographic. Even if you are completing a row each day, it's amazing how quickly you forget! Also, don't get too hung up about it. Especially here in the UK, most days most colours will appear in the sky at some point during an average day!

* Don't get hung up on finishing the blanket on December 31st. Especially if you are planning to add a border, with the size that the blanket will be that's quite a time consuming process!

* Try and find others that are doing the same challenge, there are bound to be plenty sharing their progress across social media. Join in with hashtags so that you are inspired to keep going (and inspired by how others are working on their blankets). We used the hashtag #skyblanket2016 and you can find lots of inspiration on Instagram.

* As the year draws to a close, it's time to start planning the next project! Why not have a look at my list of ideas for a year long craft project! I'm not going to be working on anything like this for a little while I don't think, I'm looking forward to trying something new, but in a couple of years time I may well be back!

Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

You can see my completed Sky Blanket here - My crochet Sky Blanket

As the end of the year approaches, my Sky Blanket project draws to a close. Although I'll finish my daily rows at the end of December, I'm planning a big border so I've a way to go yet before I share a picture of the finished blanket. I love my blanket, but working on this project over the last year has given me a few ideas about what I would do differently next time, and so I thought I'd share them.

Firstly, I would use a wider range of colours. I was adamant that I wanted to stick to the basic sky colours of blues and greys, but with hindsight I could have made a much more colourful blanket if I'd chosen some pinks and oranges for the sunsets, or a rainbow yarn. Having said that I do quite like the simple palette of my blanket so perhaps too many colours would have been a bit much.

Next time I'd definitely use a wider variety of greys though, and I'd also look for some sparkly grey yarn to make all those grey rainy days a bit more interesting!

I could have also varied my stitches a bit. I did this to a certain extent, and I do like the uniform quality of my blanket, but I've seen some fantastic examples of blankets that are almost like samplers with all sorts of different stitches.

Next time I wouldn't get too hung up on which exact colour to use. In a country like the UK with such a variety of weather, to be honest on most days I could have chosen any colour to represent the sky. As I went through the project I tended to lean towards a colour which represented the colour of the sky for most of the day, rather than looking at the sky at a strict time that day. If I'd spent a reasonable amount of the day outside, for example if we'd had a day out or I'd been for a run, then I chose a colour that represented the sky at that time.

It was a very rare day when the sky stayed the same colour for the majority of the day. I've seen some blankets where the knitter or crocheter has used a couple of different yarn colours for each row or square, and I think that works really well, I was just worried about how much yarn the blanket would end up using!

My blanket did end up very long and skinny. This meant that it was very easy to keep on top of, as each row only took me about 10-15 minutes to crochet. Perhaps next time I'd add in a few extra stitches. My blanket had a starting chain of 200, perhaps I'd up that to 250 or 300.

I could have got around this by making a blanket with different squares instead of rows. Then I could have planned the blanket right from the beginning and I would have been able to work out the rough size of the finished blanket. It would also have been more portable to take away with me. I would have to sew them up as I went along though, I can't imagine trying to sew together 365/6 squares all in one go!

In order to show the year more clearly, I would have liked to include a plain coloured row in between the rows for each month. This would have divided the blanket up nicely and perhaps made it more obvious how it related to the year as a whole. Similarly I could have done a plain row at the beginning and end, and perhaps tried to find a way to make it obvious which wintery end was which.

Finally, I would have kept a close eye on my stitch count as I went along. Being relatively new to crochet I'm still learning, and discovered at the beginning of November that I'd lost almost 40 stitches from the row. Having only started with 200, there was a significant difference between the two ends of the blanket. I was able to catch up and add them back in, but it would have been better if I'd checked every month or so and sorted it out as I went along!

I hope that these tips were helpful! I posted about the progress of my Sky Blanket monthly throughout 2016, and you can links to each monthly post here - My completed Sky Blanket.

If you are looking for a long term craft project to keep you busy for a year but aren't sure whether a Sky Blanket is the one for you, you might like the different projects that I rounded up in my blog post Ideas for a Long Term Craft Project. 

My Sky Blanket in November #SkyBlanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

Welcome to November, and only one month of my Sky Blanket left to go! To begin with, here is how my blanket has progressed so far - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September and October...

... and here it is in the usual spot on the sofa!

It is so large now that I'm working on it a few days at a time, generally catching up at the weekend. I noticed that it wasn't taking as long to crochet each row so I thought I should probably count my stitches, and was mildly alarmed to discover that I had lost nearly 40 stitches since I started - whoops! That's a lesson to me to keep an eye on these things much more regularly! So for the last couple of weeks I've been adding in a few stitches into each row and I'm back to the 200 that I started with now. I don't think that it's too obvious in the blanket as it has obviously happened gradually and the edges are quite wobbly anyway, hopefully I can stretch it out a bit when it's done.

I'm starting to make plans for when the year is finished now. The blanket is definitely going to need a border, and as it has turned out quite long and skinny I'm thinking about making a border which has quite wide sides to even it out a bit. I have quite a lot of yarn in a shade of blue that I didn't use in the blanket, so I will probably use that. It does mean that it's going to be a little while yet before the entire blanket is completed though (and it will be massive...)

I've also been adding in a few of the embellishments that I missed through the year. As we've all had our birthdays now I've added in all our birthday buttons. Harry and Mia chose their green and pink ones, I have a star, and Mia chose a large blue button for Ram.

I'm planning a few more embellishments too. I'm investigating adding some little crochet extras on, for example some Autumn leaves as the colours were so lovely this year, and perhaps a snowflake to represent cold at least if not snow. Maybe a star for Christmas. It would be nice to add a little more colour to the blanket.

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in October #SkyBlanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

As the temperature has been dropping I have been very grateful for my nice, big snuggly Sky Blanket! I usually work on a few days at a time while I'm watching television, and it's nice to be able to sit underneath it while I'm working, and when I've finished that day's row. I keep saying it, but this blanket is going to be enormous when it's finished!

Here is how my blanket has progressed so far...

January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August and September

... and here is how it is looking now:

On the 1st October I went to my friend's wedding which was a great day. It rained torrentially for the whole morning, but when we arrived the sun came out, and the afternoon was beautiful. As we were eating our meal we were treated to a beautiful double rainbow over the adjacent ruins (all the photographers came running!) and so I reflected it in my blanket with dark grey and my rainbow ribbon.

I also added a pink button for a beautiful pink sunset - now that the days are getting shorter I tend to be around for sunrise and sunset times so I'm more likely to see them. There has been quite a lot of grey this month which is a little bit of a worry as I've only got about a ball and a half of grey yarn left, fingers crossed there is still plenty of blue sky left to come!

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in September #SkyBlanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

I can't believe how quickly the year is going! It's October already, and so that means it's time for my Sky Blanket in September update post. As a reminder, here's how my blanket has progressed so far - January, February, March, April, May, June, July and August, and here is how it is looking now:

As you can see, it has long outgrown my sofa photo spot, it really is getting very large now! I hope that it's not going to end up too long and skinny, I think that we may end up using it sideways along the length of the sofa. It certainly is nice and warm and cosy to sit underneath. I'm finding it a bit of a pain to keep dragging out to work on so I've been doing a few days at a time, and trying to be good and sew in the ends as I go. It is definitely going to need a border to even out the edges a little bit, but that's going to be a good bit of work!

The month has been another mixed one, still plenty of blue in there but interspersed with grey too. I'm wondering whether when the blanket is finished there will be any distinction at all between summer and winter!

I very much like the combination of colours that I've ended up with and I like the stiches (mainly half treble) that I've used, it makes a nice solid blanket that hopefully won't stretch out of shape.

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in August #skyblanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

Another month has passed, and my Sky Blanket is getting bigger and bigger! It has long outgrown the bag that I've been keeping it in and it has become rather unwieldy to work on! This means that I've been tending to save it up and do a few rows at a time rather than pull it all out every day. It's going to be very long and thin and will definitely need a border to even up the wobbly edges, I might make it a thicker border down the sides to widen it out a bit. Luckily I have lots of yarn in a different shade of blue that I've not used for the sky colours that will hopefully look good as a border!

Here's my latest blanket photo:

Here's how my blanket has progressed so far - January, February, March, April, May, June and July.

I was hoping when I started the project that there would be a big difference between the winter ends of the blanket and the summer in the middle, and looking at it laid out it does look as though that might be the case. Although the summer hasn't been quite as blue as I had hoped!

I can't believe that I'm two thirds through the project already!

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in July #skyblanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

The months are flying by so quickly, I can't believe July is over already! I was a little behind with my Sky Blanket this month as we went away for over a week, but I'm all caught up with it now, and even though it is starting to look a little long and narrow I am really appreciating the shorter widths when it comes to keeping it up to date!

So here's my blanket in July:

Here's how my blanket has progressed so far - January, February, March, April, May and June.

Unfortunately it's been another grey month (really hoping that I have enough grey yarn to last the blanket) with some patches of grey lasting for several days. Not as many dark grey rainy days though!

The blanket is definitely going to need a border when it's finished as it's starting to look a little long and skinny, and the edges will need tidying up. I'm just trying not to think about it, because it's going to be a lot of work!

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in June #skyblanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

I can't believe that this post marks the halfway point of my Sky Blanket - the months are flying by! I'll admit that I'm finding the blanket a little unwieldy to work on now. It's pretty much square, so it's going to be a nice rectangle when it's finished. I'm so glad that I stuck to a 200 chain width, because even though it might end up quite long and skinny, it means that if I get a few days behind I can catch up quite easily. And I'm finding that I am tending to work on a few days at a time now, just because it's such an effort to haul it all out and then pack it up again into the bag when the row is done!

So, here's the blanket at the end of June:

I think I'm going to need a new photo location from next month! The edges are looking pretty wobbly, I'm hoping that a border will sort that out at the end.

My previous updates - January, February, March, April and May.

It's been a bit of a quiet month sky-wise. On the 22nd June there was a massive thunderstorm with loads and loads of rain during the evening and early hours of the next day. The first proper thunderstorm since I started my blanket, and quite possibly the most rain I've ever seen in this country! So I made a row in dark grey of half trebles in every other stitch and wove through some ribbony yarn that I received from Bergere de France, it's really slippery and shiny and definitely looks rainy. I'm sure I'll be using it again!

I also popped in a little seashell button to represent our lovely trip to Cornwall and the shells that we saw on the beach.

Sunrises are too early for me to be up now (thank goodness the days with 4.45am starts are over!) and I always seem to miss sunsets. The main problem is that we don't have any windows in the house which face east or west, and at this time of year I don't tend to be out and about at sunset time.

This month seems to have been a bit more mixed, and there's more grey than blue. I've been keeping a close eye on my yarn and I'm hoping that I have enough left in all the colours that I need. Otherwise I'll need to pick apart my granny square blanket and rescue some grey from the border!

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.

My Sky Blanket in May #skyblanket2016

My Sky Blanket is now complete! Here is a link to the completed Sky Blanket. 

Here is how my blanket progressed throughout the year - January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December.

If you have found this page because you would like to make your own Sky Blanket, you might like these posts:

Tips for completing a Sky Blanket

My Sky Blanket - What I would do differently next time

We are flying through the year now and my Sky Blanket is definitely looking blanket like! Here are my previous updates - January, February, March and April - and here is how my blanket is looking now!

I'm still working diligently away although I must admit that I'm not being as conscientious about doing my row daily, instead I tend to do three rows or so at once. Also, either this month hasn't been as interesting weather wise or else I've seen most of what the sky has to offer now with regard to the palette of colours that I'm using, as it's been pretty dull in terms of different stitches or embellishments! I did however add in a little anchor bead for the first day of our cruise holiday over half term.

My crochet is definitely improving and I'm pretty sure that I'm not losing or gaining stitches at the end of rows anymore, I've learned where I need to insert the hook to make the last stitch of the row. The edges are looking a little wobbly though, I'm really hoping that adding a border at the end will smooth it all out a bit.

There have been a few grey patches but overall there has been plenty of blue emerging as well, perhaps I don't need to panic yet about running out of grey yarn!

There was a group of us taking part in the Sky Blanket project throughout 2016, and you can find us across social media, in particular Instagram, using the hashtag #skyblanket2016. The project was started by Bug, Bird & Bee, The Boy and Me and You Little Sew and Sew.

If you aren't sure if a Sky Blanket is the project for you, you might like this blog post with some more ideas for a year long craft project.

With many thanks to Make it Coats for supplying me with the yarn for this project.