knitting weather

When we returned from the west coast to North Carolina, the weather had changed dramatically. The day we left, it was sunny, breezy and about 75 degrees. Two weeks later, it is twenty degrees cooler, and Daylight Savings has made it much darker. It's like we went from Indian Summer to late fall overnight! Though I know it took two whole weeks.

Of course, chilly mornings and dark evenings mean one important thing: knitting! Knitting and all the requisite red wine, hot chocolate, and lounging on the couch that go with it. HOORAY! Knitting weather, how I have longed for you. The real Southerners are going around whining about the cold, and while I pretend to sympathize with them and even fake little shivers in solidarity, I am loving this brisk, cool weather.

I love the dogwood trees turning deep burgundy outside my office window. I love to look into the sky and see a rainfall of bright yellow leaves blowing towards me. I love to ride my bike to work in the morning and breathe bright, cold air that wakes me up and makes me glad for the scarf I made last year. This is how you know I am no Southerner (that and the Jersey Girl twang that pops out after I've been on the phone with family).

Okay, so what's everybody knitting? As per usual for this time of year, I'm plugging away on Christmas gifts, including a desperate attempt at a sweater for HWWLLB, which feels like miles and miles of very boring stockinette. But Amisha re-inspired me with her beautiful man-sweater stitchery, and so I'm working dilligently on it.

I'm also needle-felting the external gills for the Neuse River Waterdog - finally! This is my first attempt at needle-felting, and I love it! You get so much control over shape and dimension - once I got the hang of it, it became almost like drawing with yarn. Hopefully the waterdog will get wrapped up this weekend so that he can make an appearance here some time soon.

Tomorrow, there will be a new pattern -- the sock pattern that I meant to post during October for Socktoberfest. Oh, well. Things get away from you sometimes. But I am really happy with how these socks turned out - they really are the perfect cold-weather couch-surfing project for fall.

Some couch-surfing sounds like just what I need right now. Time to make some cocoa.