I have noticed the trend of creating “temperature” quilts the last few years and have been intrigued. A temperature quilt is created by assigning certain fabrics to specific temperatures. You then create a block for each day using the appropriate color or colors for the high and/or low temperature for that day.

After doing A LOT of searching online, there are so many beautiful quilt design options to choose from, it felt very overwhelming! You’ll see what I mean if you simply do a temperature quilt search on Google images (click here).

One design that I loved uses flying geese and was created by Instagram user @silverlinedstitches Click here to check it out, it’s truly gorgeous!

Another version that is stunning was created by Linda of Flourishing Palms using curved piecing. Check it out here.

In the end decided that for my quilt design I will stick with my absolute favorite quilt element, the half square triangle. Below are the fabrics I have chosen to use for my 2021 temperature quilt.

Isn’t that a yummy rainbow fabric stack?? These are from the Ruby & Bee solids created by Heather Ross for Windham Fabrics. Being February in Indiana, I can’t wait until I get to start cutting into those warm color fabrics to make my blocks! But to start the year, I’m working with the cool colors below.

You can see in my notebook that I have assigned a different color fabric for every 5 degrees between 0 and 100. I was praying I wouldn’t need a fabric for below 0, but it looks like I might have to choose something to add later this week as it is predicted to be -8 :(

Once I assigned the fabric to each temperature range, I then cut those that I needed into 5” squares and then cut again on the diagonal to use for piecing my HSTs. I labeled scraps from each fabric to help me when assembling my blocks.

My basic quilt design is below. I am planning to alternate the direction of each HST to add some interest and movement to the quilt. At the beginning of each month, there will be one solid 4” (finished) block. At the end of the year, there will be 3 leftover solid blocks. I may decide to embroider the year or some other details in that section. The finished quilt will measure 76” x 80”.

Here is the design with the month of January temperatures filled in.

And here are the first two rows of the quilt pieced together (Jan. 1 through Feb. 5). My plan is to keep track of the high and low temperatures for each day and then at the end of the month, piece those blocks. Hopefully I won’t get too behind if I do it that way!

For the blocks themselves, the high temperature fabric is always on top when I piece the HSTs together. As you can see, January started out fairly warm, but we are getting colder now that February has arrived. It’s always my least favorite month of the year and when I wonder, why do we live here again?!?!