This is part 4 of the Happy Barnet Covid Crochet Blanket. Made to capture and remember some of the many key events and themes of this year. You can learn more about my project on my main blog post where you will also see links to the other sections of the blanket and the final completed blanket.

I hope you enjoy looking through the photos below and learning more about my project. The blanket will be donated to Edinburgh Museums and will be part of their Covid Collection.

(For mobile users: descriptions are shown below the gallery. Gallery may take a moment to load)

31. Isolation. With many restrictions in place and with many working from home, the feelings of isolation were something that many faced. Fortunately , at least in some regions, if you lived alone you were able to form a bubble or extended household with another. I think many of us learned just how impactful this situation can be and I hope it something we take greater care to support in the future when others are faced with this.

32. Tiktok. The social media platform had been around since 2018 but experienced huge growth in 2020 with people have more time on their hands and/or needing some way to enjoy themselves, share what they were experiencing or connect with others.

33. Banana Bread. Along with sourdough bread, Banana Bread was the must-bake item of the year….if you could find flour in the shops of course!

34. Exercise. The first real focus on exercise during lockdown was the incredibly popular morning youtube live streams with Joe Wicks. Meant for kids who were now stuck at home and not at school, (nearly) everyone joined in and it became the way to start your day. Beyond that, in the strictest of lockdowns we were still encouraged to use our 1hr exercise time to go out for a local walk/run etc. There seemed to be two main things that would happen here, folk would either get pretty bored with their own location and/or they would discover places and routes near their home they had never known about before.

35. Tears. This was a suggestion from a friend and a very good one to make. I think everyone I know has cried about something in relation to all this, whether it be a significant event such as the loss of someone to Covid or loss of work, or the stress and anxiety of the new day to day life we are all experiencing.

36. Wine. A bit of a running joke, day drinking or drinking through the lockdown was a bit of a theme but on the flip side, many did find it harder to deal with their relationship with alcohol during this time and have struggled with the difficulties of managing this, often alone.

37. Cup of tea. Another suggestion and one I’m definitely on board with. Being at home so much more I don’t think I’ve boiled my kettle this much in my life! As well as endless cuppas for myself, garden catch ups, when restrictions allowed with the essential brew (and bottle of hand sanitiser on the side), were a god send. I was fortunate to be able to have morning cuppa catch ups through the fence with my neighbour throughout the summer which did wonders for my day.

38. Home decorating. If there’s a house left in Britain without a geometric painted wall, I’ll be amazed! With many unable to work but needing something to do, all those DIY projects suddenly got a bit of attention and with so much more time spent at home, it was time for redecoration for pretty much all of us.

39. Furlough. Not all jobs could be done from home and with many businesses experiencing a sudden down turn they didn’t require all staff. To reduce or ideally avoid the need for redundancies, the furlough scheme was lunch where the government would pay a portion of furloughed staff’s salaries allowing companies to keep those staff employed but not actively in work. The amount varied over time and companies were allowed to top up the payments but initially it did start at 80% of salary which is what is pictured here.

40. The Covid 19lbs. Who would have thought not going out, sitting on your sofa, comforting eating sourdough bread and banana bread and washing it down with some wine would result in weight gain! So many of us put weight on in 2020 that it was referred to the as the Covid stone or the Covid 19lbs.