Baked Hats or Something Like That

Wild is the music of autumnal winds  
Amongst the faded woods. --William Wordsworth

We've been having a reprieve from all the rain over the last few days - just a few showers here and there. It has been unseasonably warm, and I'm not complaining. If you've been reading my blog for a while, you know how I can't stand it when it snows on the Island. I'll take rain if it means I don't have to deal with icy roads and sidewalks.

It was quite windy and stormy this morning while I was at the gym. I greeted an older fellow who was warming up and said, "It sure is windy out there, hey?"

To which he replied, "Yeah... looks like it's going to blow everything away."

And then, he looked out the window for a long while and said nothing, seemingly lost in thought. I wondered what he was thinking about. He didn't say... he eventually just picked up his stuff and carried on.

You never know what people are carrying inside of them.

The damp weather has stalled my knitting, since I'd finished a hat two days ago and soaked it for blocking, and it was STILL damp this morning. I decided there was nothing for it: the knitting MUST dry. So I employed the most effective method for drying blocking knitting projects:

I did some baking. Nothing like firing up the oven to get the knits drying. And no, I didn't bake the hat.

I made two loaves of wholemeal soda bread and a double batch of blueberry and cranberry scones. I even broke out my cake stand for the scones and set it all next to my birthday flowers (which are still strongly in bloom). I temporarily forgot about my blocking problem and reveled in the sight:

And yes, by this afternoon, the hat was dry. I improvised it from a similar pattern on Ravelry. It was one of those patterns where I said, "I bet I could knit that." And I did... but it took me three tries to get it right:

I knit it with just over two skeins of Shibui Knits Sock yarn, now discontinued. It's a kettle-dyed colourway called Mulberry, which I love, but like all purples and plums, it's notoriously difficult to photograph. I think this photo is probably the closest (that is if your monitor settings are the same as mine). It was the cast on that kept messing me up - too tight, too small, too loose... I eventually figured out how to do a long tail tubular cast on, and that ended up being just the ticket. I held two strands together to keep the purple and black lowlights from pooling.

I'm quite happy with the result, though I'm not sure if I'll ever get used to wearing a slouchy hat. I haven't yet figured out how to make them look as cute on me as they look on other people. Maybe it's because I always hate taking photos of my hats while they're actually on my head. I think most people hate hat photos. We're so used to having our hair framing our faces that a hat just seems jarring:

Yeah... that's a lot of face in that photo:

Meanwhile, I dug out seven balls of yet another discontinued yarn to play with yesterday:

I have a few ideas of what I want to try with it, but for now, I'm just enjoying the sandy tones in it. They remind me of the badlands of Alberta, where I used to live... I want to experiment with some short rows to see if I can echo some of the undulating sandstone layers I drove past every day to work:

It's the season when all of the Christmas stuff starts popping up: Christmas muzak in the supermarkets,  craft markets popping up here and there. I keep thinking I want to attend a market, but my festive spirit is not really firing up... not sure if it will. I may need to drop out of sandstone knitting and try making a snowman or something to cheer myself up.

Or maybe not. I think there are plenty who will hold up the holiday cheer for now.

I'm off to find some suitable needles for my next project. Have a good week.