more temperature afghan

I've been doing a lot of work in the planning stage of the temperature afghan.

The year I chose to start with is 2013. I am going to use the high temperature from each day. It would be neat to do one with the lows too but so much work. LOL Just how many afghans do we need, eh?

I got the temperature information from Wunderground for the year. I copied the two columns which show the day and the high temp for that day. I put that in Notepad, then copied to Microsoft Word. For some reason this makes everything double spaced and the date is on one line and the temp on another line. So ... I made them single spaced, then I put each temp on the proper line with the day. Yes, that was a lot of work. I could have just copied the two columns and put in Word directly and I did, in fact, try that but the columns came out inches apart and I couldn't figure out how to get them to hug. In any case, I wanted to print it all out for easier reference. So by putting the info into three columns, it went from 13 pages to 4. It worked for me. You may have a better method.

I knew that there would not be any highs lower than 30 so I started with 30 and checked each temperature to 100 to see how many there were so I could determine my colors for each category. Yes, this also took quite a while but I like that stuff. Details. Numbers. I am intrigued. LOL

Just to show you what I mean (and for future reference), here are the results. Remember these are the high temperatures for the year 2013, January to December. These numbers will help you to figure how much yarn to buy in each color. (Temperatures are in Fahrenheit)

45 (1) 
46 (4)
48 (2)
total 7 

51 (2)
52 (7)
53 (3)
54 (3)
55 (11)
57 (4)
59 (4)
total 34 

60 (6)
61 (4)
62 (3)
63 (5)
64 (13)  
66 (12)
68 (6)
69 (5)
total 54

70 (9)
71 (5)
72 (8)
73 (20)
75 (23) 
77 (11)
78 (10)
79 (7)
total 93

80 (4)
81 (8)
82 (25)
84 (13)
86 (14)
87 (11)
88 (16)
89 (13) 
total 104

90 (19)
91 (32) 
93 (14)
95 (6)
96 (2)
97 (1)  
total 74 

In this case there are six groups. However, three of those groups are very large and could be divided to give more variety in coloring.

After much hemming and hawing and thinking and changing around here are my final groupings with color.
40s ILTY Mixed Berry
50s RHWL Boysenberry
60-64 RHSS Blue
65-69 RHSS Delft Blue
70-72 RHSS Med Thyme73-75 RHSS Tea Leaf
76-79 Impeccable Fern
80-85 VC Mustard
86-89 RHSS Yellow
90-92 RHSS Pumpkin
93-97 RHSS Red

While that does still give me quite a large segment of mustard (50), yellow (54) and pumpkin (51), it allows me to go from the cool purple to the hot red. The Mixed Berry and Boysenberry are a little bit of a cheat. They should be more blue but the only blue purple I have is DK weight. However, it still shows the variation in temperature which is what it is meant to do.

The next step, if you want to do this, is to put the actual yarn color next to the line so you don't have to keep going back and forth to figure it out.

For example, 
Jan 2013
1  78  tea leaf
2  53  boysenberry

Of course you would use your own colors and grouping.

I haven't quite made up my mind about the pattern yet but will soon. The pattern and stitch or stitches you use will also impact how much yarn you need. I decided to go with yarns I knew I would be able to find easily should I run out before I'm done.

In the meantime I am still working on the purple square afghan. I am edging each square in green and then will put them together. I thought about using the join as you go, but decided against it. Who knows why. LOL That's just me.

I also still have a spider stitch lapghan that I started a while back and a hat using the Who scarf colors. I'm sure I'll get to them eventually.

I am also still coloring, which I enjoy when I can get to it. I received a new book for Christmas which I'm anxious to delve into and some new pens as well.

There you have it. What I've spent the past days working on. I will be doing the figuring for a second temperature ghan, if I survive this one. That one will be for last year, 2016.

Happy crocheting!
Sandie