After having such a wonderful time creating the 2025 Book Blanket, I knew I wanted to make another for 2026’s reading. But I wanted to try something different, and I had a vague idea in my head. With 32 books completed in the first 5 months of the year, I’ve now got a decent enough “sample size” to show you a glimpse of my vision.

Instead of trying to match my crochet to book covers, I wanted a broader view of my year’s reading. After debating whether I should track by month-read versus genre versus source, I decided to go with month-read. Then came the decision about color and “coding”, and believe me, I had quite a few options in mind. What I landed on was assigning each month a color of yarn, then crocheting rectangles of varying widths to represent book spines, one per book read each month.

To keep up with what color represents what month {and a quick way to help pick colors}, I’ve made a bookmark/card to keep with my crocheted pieces. After accidentally going very pastel for the first part of the year, I’m trying to work in more saturated colors, and the May color is a lot more purple than appears in these photographs. At the end of the year, I will mix them all up and join them together, similar to the example below.

My hope is that as they are attached, they will look like books on a shelf. To further expand the “bookshelf” concept {and add much-needed size to the blanket}, I will also crochet rows between the spine blocks to create the illusion of the interior bookcase and the actual shelves. I might attempt to crochet some shelf decorations too, but that might be a bit beyond my skill set.

It will be interesting to see how this project comes together, but I am pleased that so far the rough layout is matching the picture in my head. With more spines {and more colors!}, I think it will really take shape. The hardest part will be adjusting and adding rounds to make it a usable blanket size. Although I guess I could always turn it into a border sampler of sorts, to create a very elaborate frame for the book case … Hmm … Many things to think about, but still many more books to read and create until decisions must be made!

Have you ever tried something like this?
What’s your tried-and-true method for getting a blanket bigger?