“Make sure you do all your winter shopping. You’ll need warm gear for Boise.”, said the lady.

“How cold does it get over there?”, I asked.

“In the winter, it’s about 20 degrees Fahrenheit.”

Having lived in Southern California for the last 10 years, my immediate response before I could filter my thoughts was:

“Holy cow. How do you people live?”

The day that my flight landed, it snowed. This was the first week in November. It was a bad omen. The next couple of weeks, it was full on winter – with temperature never breaking 20. I thought to myself: “They lied to me.”

It was then that I realized that I was going to need a much warmer sweater than all the sweaters in my arsenal. Knitting was no longer a hobby – it had become a necessity. I got crankin’.

This is my Turkey Waddle Sweater. I completed it on my Thanksgiving trip out to Detroit to see my best friend and his family, and was able to snap a few pictures by his parents’ lake house. If you look carefully, I am wearing 3 layers of clothing in this picture. Photo-snapping session lasted about 5 minutes before I dashed into the house for my down jacket. This ex-Californian is thin blooded. We don’t do cold – no we don’t.

Materials: Less than 7 balls of Rowan Yorkshire Tweed Chunky, in Lobster (I think), Sz 10.5 needles for body and Sz 10 needles for the ribbing and sleeves.

Notes:  Sweater was knit bottom up, with 3-needle shoulder bind off, and then the sleeves were knit top-down ala Barbara Walker style. There was no waist-shaping, and the only mod that I made was to start the ribbing from the elbow down.

Braced with the warmest sweater I’ve ever had, I thought I was ready to go back to Boise and conquer the cold. I spent an entire weekend inside the confines of my new apartment and watched the snow outside. By spying on my neighbors, I even figured out how to use that weird looking contraption that they call a windshield ice scraper. Totally saved me an embarrassing experience of asking strangers how to use the damn thing.

Monday morning. Four layers of clothing. Two layers of socks. Arm warmer. Cashmere fingerless gloves underneath a pair of fur lined leather gloves. Stepped outside the door, and checked the temperature on my iPhone and it said “4 deg Fahrenheit”. Stepped back inside the apartment.

“Please route all my work calls to my cellphone. I’m working from home today. I ain’t driving in 4 degree weather.”

They lied. They told me it was 20 degrees.

It didn’t help that every Friday afternoon, one of my office mates would come in and tell me that it would be snowing in the weekend, and that it’d be really fun to go up to the mountains. He conveyed his weekly weather reports with such fervor and gusto – even after I had mentioned that nature and I don’t really get along.

To this day I still can’t figure out whether or not he was trying to interest me in outdoor snow activities or scare the shit out of me.

(simple lines, hidden pockets, and epaulets)

What I happen to have is also 7 balls of chunky yarn that was originally purchased to make Tikru’s Greengable. Unfortunately, I realized it wasn’t enough. Since then, the yarn has been staring me in the face gnawing at me to make something out of it. So when the startitis bug hit, I gave in to the temptation of instantly casting on. I made a mental list of the qualities that I want from this jacket, and I realized that given the possibility of running out of yarn, the jacket should be:

• Knit top down, but with short-rows for shoulder shaping
• With top down set-in sleeves
• Have vertical slit pockets on both fronts, also top down
• High collar
• Sleeve, bottom and collar bands in contrast color, but keep front button bands in same color
• Epaulets! Wee….

Of course it was then that I realized that there is no pattern for all the things that I want to do, so what better time than to make my own? That’s right – my jacket is going to have ALL of those qualities. Barbara Walker, don’t let me down now. And this is what I have to show for it after 2 days.

(a big lump of chunky yarn)

Oh yea, and I’m also knitting a pair of Aquaphobia Socks on the side too. You can never have too many WIPs.

(jah…I is busy)

Yarn: Nature Araucania Wool Chunky
Needle Size: 11 circs
Notes: For this hat, I based the directions on Knit One Felt Too’s Classic Cloche, and used some cream colored wool I had lying around. After felting repeatedly in my teeny tiny bathroom sink (now I understand why Emily Mills charges $200-300 for a hat.. damn.. that was hard work), I took my scissors and went at it. Oh, did ya notice my awesome hat blocker? It’s a round bowl stacked on top of my IKEA pot. Just the perfect size, 21-22″ around. For the embellishments, I bought a yard (who sells roving in yards? Don’t they sell them by weight?) of orange roving at my LYS when I picked up a set of felting needles. From then on it’s just stab stab stab stab… very therapeutic if you ask me. Good workout for the flabbies on the arms too….

You didn’t think that’s all did you?….BAM!