That thing where it’s all a lie

I felt it a few days ago, and I fell for it. The first tiny possible edges of spring. I was walking to the store and I saw water on the ground, seeping out from under the icebergs. The sun was shining, and bought a ticket on the crazy train.  I bought tulips. I got my bike out, I vowed that from now on I would ride it everywhere I went, and then it snowed, and then yesterday morning when I got up the whole city had frozen over again into a wasteland of despair from which we will certainly never be released. Joe and I were heading out yesterday morning, and when we opened the door, we both uttered spontaneous expletives.  It was -18 with the wind, and as we walked, our hearts sank. We glared at the dirty old snow, scowled at the mountains of ice pushed into the cities corners… I did my best to remember where we live, and that this is normal for us, and tried reset my expectations. Of course March is horrible. It’s usually horrible right into April. It is so unreasonable to expect Spring right now that I can’t believe I fell for its flirty little overture.  Spring is a nasty little tease, and today (when I drag my bike across the ice field that is my back garden) I’m going to vow not to get too excited. If this is Spring, it is the beginning of it. It is the part where you go outside without a hat because you so desperately want it to be true, and then worry about frostbite on your scalp.  It is spring in name only. It is a lie.

Even though I got a grip on myself pretty quickly, one little part of it stuck. The urge to knit something quick and springy and fresh, but still warm and cozy, and I realized that if I want to knit a spring thing that fast, there’s only one person in the family little enough for me to pull it off, and that’s my new niece, wee Myrie.

myriesweatertulip 2014-03-24

I grabbed something springy from the stash – gorgeous superwash wool, dyed with weld and indigo from Abundant Yarn and Dyeworks, and settled on a quick Tiny Tea Leaves.

I thought I could knit it in one day, but it turns out this little sweater isn’t that quick. First, maybe you can knit that sweater in a day, if you actually sat down for the whole day to knit, which I didn’t. I don’t know who I think is going to do all my other stuff while I’m sitting there, but I couldn’t make it happen. Also, I chose the size two, because that Myrie, she’s growing faster than crocuses sprout (when they finally turn up, that is) and sizes for babies tend to run small.  So many parents with six month old babies dress them in a size one, or larger – and I didn’t want to have it be too tiny, too fast.

tealeavesdet 2014-03-24Let it here be noted that this pattern isn’t lying at all. It is an honest to goodness size two – so it’s a little more knitting than I planned. (And might mean that if I want Myrie to have a spring sweater, rather than an autumn one, I might have to knit another littler one after this. We shall see how it fits the little Miss- and besides, she’ll be bigger by the time I finish this tomorrow.)  Third, and I can’t stress this enough, the way this pattern works is yarn and knitting intensive – the ever-so-charming gathers on the yoke are created by doubling the stitches, then decreasing again after several rows, and you wouldn’t be expecting there to be many rows with almost 300 stitches on them in a tiny little sweater, but there it is.

tinytealeavestulip 2014-03-24

Despite these three things absolutely being obvious from the get go, I was a little surprised when after knitting for ten minutes, I didn’t have a sweater.  I think it’s doable today, but then again, I also thought it was spring, that Adriana would finish herself while I knit this, and that the smell in the fridge would go away if I didn’t think about it.

Clearly, the winter has made me delusional.

PS: For anyone keeping track this episode of the annual “snap like a twig and knit a baby a spring sweater” appears to have happened two weeks earlier than the similar one last year, which I blame on the outstanding performance of this winter in the category of “harsh.”

PPS: If you’re in Toronto, don’t forget that Rachel Herron is making a book tour stop here this evening.  She’s lovely.

 

 

96 thoughts on “That thing where it’s all a lie

  1. Same thing happened here in Southcentral Alaska… We had a day where you could sense the returning light, be fooled by the blue sky, and all and then–wham!–we got almost 24″ of snow in about 24 hours. Nope, nope, nope. Not spring yet!

    Love the spring-like color of Myrie’s new sweater!

  2. I fell for it in our area a month ago. I went to the garden center and they enabled me. I bought my plants. I planted them (tomatoes and peppers, i was ambitious).

    My husband said he listened to the staff at his work talk about how this “was the weekend when all the inexperienced gardeners get foolish and put out their plants.” and how they were all destined for a life of failure and merciless mockery.

    He Kept Quiet. (good man)

    And then a week later there was a freeze and all my plants died.

    Just so you aren’t feeling alone in your optimism.

    But I live in Texas and last weekend put new tomatoes again yesterday… hopefully I didn’t just waste some more money.

  3. It has been a long winter down there Steph! I would have snapped weeks ago….i think we are in for another month of despair here in fairbanks too…however we do have incredibly sunny days right now..

  4. I, too, am craving a quick easy spring knit.
    But there are no babies in my life this year. 4 years old is no longer a baby!
    Someone better get busy, so I have a baby to knit for next year.
    Meanwhile, I’m making neon “I’m sick of winter” socks.

  5. That’s a sweet pattern. I made it for my daughter who is six. She has very narrow shoulders, but is long in the torso, so the neck was too big. I used your trick of a row of single crochet on the inside of the neck – made it perfect. She wore it last week to school for the first time because it is spring here in North Texas. I understand you will be in North Texas soon. The forecast for the weekend is highs in the seventies (Fahrenheit). Maybe you should pick Adriana back up…

    • Well, I’m replying to myself – nothing new as I talk to myself frequently. I thought Tiny Tea Leaves was the color of the yarn. In reading through the comments, I realized it was the pattern. I have not made this pattern. I made a SOMEWHAT SIMILAR pattern called the Ruched Yoke Tee. The rest of my comment is accurate… unless they change the forecast…

  6. Well, here in central Québec, it’s been too cold (yesterday morning it was -30 with the wind…) to even dream that spring will ever make an appearance.
    With over a meter of snow still on the ground, we’ll probably go directly from winter to summer.
    When? I wish I knew…

  7. So, here’s how it goes in Southern New Hampshire. March begins with spine crushing cold and then, quite blithely, twirls into several days of warm sunshine and moderate temperatures. The mountain of snow melts leaving behind an impressive depth of mud – mud that my yellow Labrador Retrievers think is the most exciting thing since peanut butter dog biscuits. I buy daffodils and a lemon scented candle. I crack the windows a bit. I shave my legs for their emergence into the air. And then, without warning, we get snow. And freezing rain. And spine crushing cold again. But me, ever the optimist, knows that April can’t be far behind. Right? Don’t tell me if I’m wrong.

    • April isn’t far behind. The problem- is it Good April, with crocuses, forsythia and sunshine? Or is it Evil April, with feet of snow, howling winds and a sting in her tail?

      (And I’m bitterly envious- I’m also in southern NH and you must have a south-facing yard. Mine still has a foot of snow on the grass and a three foot snowbank on top of the crocuses.)

  8. I’m in South Dakota where it was 65F on Friday and where we’re now having snow flurries. I have to remind my southerner husband every year that a typical South Dakota springtime actually means there will be more snow!

    I made the Tiny Tea Leaves for a new niece in January. It’s a lovely little knit that only took one skein of sock yarn (I used Loopy Ewe Solids).

  9. If it makes you feel any better, Spring has started here in AL. Bradford pears, cherry trees, and our wonderful wild flowers. Trees are leafing out. However if we get the frigid record cold weather they predict for us Tuesday night, Spring will be stopped in its tracks and the rest of the flowers will be gone until next year.

    On the plus side, I know better than to plant ahead of our last freeze date of April 15 and I am not a zone pusher. May will be here soon. Just be glad you won’t see summer temps that soon, we usually do.

  10. Perhaps you’re getting “soft” because you’ve spent a fair amount of time below the border?? No matter, life has a way of giving you whatever she thinks you need! The sweater is so pretty and looks very springy.

  11. At least you’ll get some spring this coming weekend when you come down to Texas. The DFW area is supposed to be in the 70s. Something to look forward to 🙂

  12. The size 2 is the smallest that pattern is available in. Maybe a short trip into the washer to felt it a touch with the size issue? I do it for my socks sometimes.

  13. It’s all a trick, right down to the daffodil stems peeking up out of the ground. It wouldn’t be Michigan without a snowstorm in April. Or May. Let’s not even talk about the time it snowed in June.

    • Presbytera, my dad Georgia/Tennessee dad always said it’s not spring in Michigan until it’s snowed on the tulips three times. This may be the year he’s wrong, since I don’t expect to sight any tulip spears before May.

    • The year we moved to Michigan (1972?) there was a killing frost. In June. My Tuscon-born mother hasn’t been warm since.

      • Right? But if the flowers are dumb enough to come up too soon, it’s their problem — not mine.

        I’m a real pattern card of loving nature/creation/mother earth, eh? *snarl*

    • When I was about 8 it snowed on the first of June, in Edinburgh, Scotland. I am resisting the urge to buy fresias. I will no it submit to the lies of spring. But may go look at a few patterns…

  14. Thank you, Stephanie–if I’m not the only one knitting a baby sweater and thinking I’ll immediately have to go make a smaller one when I’m done, that makes it easier to keep getting the first one done. And I’ve got a strict time limit going on here, plane tickets bought.

  15. Today is my 60th birthday! And my sister’s 56th birthday. It may be due to my age, but, I do remember our birthdays being in the spring with warm spring temperatures. Today I would love a fresh spring bouquet of daffodils–my favorite flower. But spring does not come by our birthday anymore.

  16. Mother Nature is tricking the East Coast too.
    On the weekend, the day started off so beautiful and spring-like, that I wore my sneakers for the first time in ages! Then it became increasingly cloudier and then it snowed most of the night.
    And then, there’s a big Nor’easter coming through Wednesday, which they think will bring 50cm and 110km/h winds (that’s category 1 hurricane strength).

    Hang in there, winter can’t last forever! Before you now it, April will be here and we’ll all melt out into sizzling summer when we’ll all complain it’s too hot.

  17. Beatcha. Mine hit last week, and even though Brandy Fortune’s less-than-compellingly-named “Garter Stitch Cardigan” (the one with the asymmetrical closure — I used two vertical buttons) is simple as pie, I decided it would look better in fingering weight than in worsted, which made for recalculating and, um, a whole bunch more stitches. Still, my friend’s brilliane in doing the stripes in a variegated yarn made me burn to try it, and the sneaky little pattern does those rows last, but that puppy is done. Unless you’re going to be petty and count weaving in ends. And sewing on buttons. And blocking. But the FUN part is done.

  18. I, like the rest of the country (and others), am anxious for Spring. I’ve got spring coloured yarn to knit, but I am still knitting wintery things…though to be honest, the current scarf I’m working on is thicker than I thought it would be. I was thinking/hoping it would be light and airy, but it isn’t. I’m OK with that, but I want to knit something light and airy. That will be on the block next…I hope.

  19. I made the baby version of that pattern. It was a lovely knit. Due to a horrible mis-understanding I was under a serious deadline and made the smallest size in 2 days. My hands hurt for 3… I will make the pattern again, but never under those limits

    I think that Father Time and Mother Nature have stopped speaking to each other?

  20. In Manitoba, where this winter there were days when it was colder than at the North Pole, colder than Siberia, we had our Fake Spring Day two weeks ago when it wasn’t even technically spring. It was 4C and all the snow slid off my metal roof on to the walkway to a depth of about four feet. My lovely sons shovelled it aside to re-create the walkway, and in the process made a seven-foot mound that they turned into a snow fort. Since then it has been -30C on a couple of days, and well below zero on all days, so that as I look out of my window I still have a seven-foot snow pile in my line of vision. I’m a canny old bird and have not yet been seduced into knitting anything remotely springlike unless you count red socks for myself. My main project is boot socks, one pair brown tweed and one pair grey marl, for my farmer neighbours across the road, to thank them for taking their front-end loader to my driveway after the last blizzard and clearing it right down to the bare gravel. I should go raid the stash for my spring project. We do have one springlike thing though – a litter of brand-new puppies who form a cuddle-puddle of warm bodies when they sleep. It’s enchanting.

  21. I’m glad I am not hte only one feeling this way! Here in Calgary we also had warm weather 2 weeks ago – enought I thought about getting my winter tires off (obviously completely delusional!) and then it snowed… and snowed some more…then it flurried… and this morning was -18C… I’m knitting my first laceweight shawl in a beautiful yellow, and hoping I can wear it sometime in June…

  22. Hate to harsh your buzz, but that wasn’t spring, that was climate change melting the snow. If it makes you feel any better, we didn’t have much of a winter in So/Calif. Maybe 1 month, in December.
    I like the simplicity of those tulips and the yarn for that sweater, they both make the statement. So you didn’t finish knitting in it in one day? Are you loosing your mojo?

  23. LOL we haven’t had a winter in Switzerland, it just got stuck over there in Canada, I guess… but it was spring last week with happy naked children leaping around in the sunshine for their mother’s spring birthday and then this afternoon, it first hailed – and then snowed. Sigh.

    That Tiny Tea Leaves is a lovely knit – I have made several, two for my own little granddaughter Mireille 😉 (my granny – yes, she’s a great-great-grandmother at 97 – can’t say “Mireille” and calls her Muriel instead LOL)

  24. Such a beautiful sweater, and from the looks of the models on Ravelry it can easily be worn a little large. Surely it will entice true Spring to arrive.

    I lived in Denver for 40 years and because of the high altitude was deceived many times by false Spring. I feel for you.

  25. Fortunately, the baby I met on the weekend was already wearing a charming knit sweater – so I might be safe. (knit by grandma for current mom and still beautiful!).

  26. I recently made this same pattern. I was cross that Tosh didn’t include a measured drawing so I could plan and check as I knitted. I’m a visual/map kind of person.

    In spite of of how the pattern was written – all prose – it turned out beautifully. The neckline is fairly wide, and the sleeves puff slightly Jane Austen-style over the shoulders. Very slight A-line effect on the body. It looks like my girl will be able to wear it for 2 years; now it’s long, later it will be a bolero. If you want a snugger crew neck, consider adding I-cord or crochet to finish.

    I won’t start on winter. Everybody has already said it better.

  27. When I need a fix like this, I go for the 5 hour baby sweater, it’s not as pretty but nice— and if it were for a niece, I might do 350 stitches to have gathers… I have been contemplating my Spring pick me up.. the forever alpaca sweater which is being knit from my first shearing all hand washed, carded and spun is getting old…I am going stash diving for some color changing cotton tonight….

  28. Spring is being a nasty little tease all across North America, and I am so glad that I don’t depend on flowering trees for my livelihood.

    Saturday was sunny and in the 60’s (though not as warm as blue skies and the temperature would make you think…the wind was snapping at the flags). Yesterday was overcast, in the 40’s, and spitting rain. Today, it is sunny, but no warmer and the wind is again snapping the flags. Tomorrow, we start with snow and then it will change to rain…about as cold a rain as you can have and not have frozen precipitation.
    The daffodils are blooming, but they can handle the cold. The tulip trees, the cherry trees and the Bradford pears are starting to bloom…and their tender flowers are going to get blasted tonight into tomorrow.

  29. I feel your pain, Steph… I started knitting a leaf lace blanket on Saturday in a lovely asparagus green, because I just couldn’t stand winter anymore.

    Sadly, none of the babies in my family belong to knitworthy parents (I learned that the hard way) so I have no babies to knit for. Do I care? No. Does this blanket have an intended home? Nope. Imma knit it anyway 😉

    • We need the rain too (also in NZ) I am just pleased that all this talk of the weather has stopped the death threats on Adrian…..the Adrian in my life is our son, and he does not need frogging!
      I am knitting a prem size top-down for our neonatal unit and got to 154 stitches…..how can something so tiny require so many.

  30. Well, at least the view from inside is undeniably springish (gorgeous photos of both those stunning red tulips and wee little tea-leaves). As for me, I’m blaming the stale indoor air (is there any oxygen left?) and probable vitamin D deficiency for my own delusions lately, knitting or otherwise. Canada can be a cruel beauty at this time of year.

  31. May I suggest fingerless mitts? An enticing combination of “warm but not fully wintery” with “quick knit”!!

    Unrelated: do others have issues with the “prove you’re not a robot” device asking you to drag items that are not shown? For example: Drag the House when what is shown is folder, cat, eye, umbrella, airplane? This happened to me the other day too….after three tries it offered me a choice that was pictured. Is it user error? Or a glitch?

    • YEP!! Everytime I get on. What helps after they reject you as a human, is to start by dragging the icon first, then type name/email; if it still doesn’t work. Then close this site, and go back in.

    • I always have problems with the prove-you’re-human thing, so much so that I’ve learned to highlight and copy my post before I press “Post Comment” because I get rejected every time (I’m getting a bit of a complex about it)…. At least that way I don’t have to retype my pearls of wisdom 🙂

  32. I am in North Carolina and let me tell you, winter is still upon us and spring is being so slow. Quit dragging your feet spring! We are ready! On Saturday is was in the 70s and gloriously sunny. By yesterday afternoon we had a cold miserable pounding rain. Woke up this morning and it was in the 30s. Tomorrow we are forecast for possible snow. Normally this time of year we have a string of lovely warm days and the trees are blooming. The Bradford Pears are blooming but I have yet to see that lovely green haze of leaves among the other trees. I know that these temps might not seem that cold to the people in the north, but for those of us in the south it has been a very long and very cold winter.

  33. As a fellow Torontonian, I feel your pain. Literally. I, too, snapped and started a quick spring cardigan for myself. I feel with our powers combined, we will make spring happen!

    • I am in Central MN, but I am considering knitting mittens too – but maybe just to get a jump on next year? Perhaps I can bring on spring by knitting the mittens so that I hurry up and finish them, and spring hurries up and arrives so my work is not needed. #hopespringseternal #punintended

  34. I refuse to speak of winter. Instead I will speak of the beautiful tulips you have in that lovely vase. A very wise woman told me a number of years ago that every vase of tulips does NOT need the fancy package of “food” that comes with them. What they need is a tiny sprinkle of sugar in slightly warm water and a couple of pennies, at least 2 for each dozen stems. Do NOT change the water, simply keep adding to it so the stems do not dry out, do not re-cut the stems. I’ve been doing this ever since she told me about it and I have had some bunches of tulips last nearly 2 full weeks. Interesting factoid: tulip stems continue to grow in the vase, up to 2 or 3 inches and often in different directions than you would expect. There you go – feel more spring-like now? Chris S

  35. I SO very much feel you on this. Here in Minneapolis/St.Paul, the morning wind chill made me wish for long-johns, halfway from the parking lot. I think we can take it that March will be snowy, but the lingering cold is what is sucking the soul out of us. My sympathies to my East Coast compatriots – sorry to hear it’s going to be worse, there. I’m knitting up socks in a colorway called “Bee my Friend”, even if I despair I will ever see a flower again.

  36. If it is any consolation, it is getting colder here in Australia. Summer has definitely moved on and Autumn has settled in (not that I am complaining, Autumn is my favourite season). Surely logic dictates that if the hot weather has left the Southern Hemisphere it must be on it’s way to our Northern neighbours 🙂

  37. I believe in you! I believe in Spring… although she does test one’s patience.. siggggggghhhh! Please pull off something Spring-like in yarn and give us hope. 🙂 And how do you pronounce “Myrie”? Is it Meerie? MY-ree?

  38. Although I’m as sick of winter as everybody else, I almost don’t want it to end. Here in the Big Windy, we have only two seasons: winter and roadwork. I don’t know if I’m ready to have the latter add an hour each way to my daily commute!

  39. Oh for pete’s sake! You’re coming to Dallas, but it’s sold out, and too far to drive. And Rachael Herron is coming to Canada (also too far to drive), where you are.

    Feeling a bit marooned down here in south Texas. Don’t hate us for the balmy weather. It’s all we’ve got right now.

  40. Hi Steph,

    just looked on Rav and it seems there is a baby version! Hurrah, for I may knit it for my newish niece (yay for a girl thing to knit, as I have 7 nephews…)

  41. Well, it is a lovely sweater for any reason. Honestly I’d love to trade some weather…it is freaky blah, sameness here in NorCal. Hopefully a bit of water from the sky tomorrow. Pretty springy yarn too.

  42. I know that this may make me deeply unpopular but… I like winter better than summer. I like winter better than spring. I love fall most of all, and granted right now where I live winter is barely winter, but I HAVE lived in a very cold and snowy place, and I still like winter. Especially as a knitter, because I can DO something about cold – but heat? Once you’re naked, you’re naked, and if you’re still hot, you’re in trouble 😉

    • yes! i totally agree! there is only so much you can do to get cooler, and even if you do cool off, you are still sticky. and summer seems to expect so much more from you- you don’t feel like you can just sit and enjoy, you should be doing something all the time, yardwork or sports or activities. somehow you feel like you should be having a great time all the time, and anything less is not right. in winter, just getting through is enough, and any fun is a bonus!

  43. Stephanie, just close your eyes and recall your AZ appearance on your book tour: no coats to be seen anywhere…that should elp you to stay in a somewhat “Spring’ish” state of mind 🙂

  44. I’m with you, Sarah V. @9:37PM. As I have no thermostat, I am happier adding layers and layers of wooly warmth than wishing that I could tear my skin off in oppressive heat and humidity. That being said, it does seem as though Spring is a bit sluggish this year – at Lake Michigan yesterday it was sunny but b-r-r-r-r cold and windy, but the frozen water and snow-covered dunes were gloriously beautiful. Nature’s drama, whistling through my uncovered ears.

  45. I totally feel your pain. I’m in Georgia and tomorrow night our temperature will be 27 deg. That is so wrong on so many levels I can’t even say.

  46. I hear ya. It went above zero a week and a half ago…just long enough to melt all the snow on the sidewalks and roads into slush. I felt…hope. For the first time in months. I left the house without long-johns and I switched out my Who scarf for something lighter.

    The next day the temps plummeted 20 degrees and turned all that slush into rock hard ice. And there it remains, lumpy bumpy ice patches, interspersed with patches of slick ice. Then a few days later our ‘chance of snow’ turned into a raging blizzard for a few hours with a fresh dump of white stuff over ice. How friggin’ festive.

    The forecast promises +4 on the weekend. I think they’re big fat liars and this is the new ice age. In self defense I knit a neon pink dress with black skulls for my granddaughter’s doll. If this keeps up much longer, I might as well sign all my paycheques over to my LYS as I buy bright skeins of yarn whenever I feel really desperate. Which is often.

    I now leave you with a Rick Mercer video to make you smile 🙂 http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/03/14/rick-mercer-warm-weather_n_4966854.html

    Barb in Winnipeg

  47. It isn’t much better in Ohio. The piles of snow have almost all melted, but we’re supposed to get another inch by tomorrow. I hope the flowers haven’t tried to grow because winter obviously isn’t done with us either. I just finished a Baby Bunny hat to donate at a knitting workshop, but that didn’t make it spring. Maybe yours has better weather mojo.

  48. I’m a Texas girl living in Colorado and thought I knew better than to get excited about Spring up here until May. Apparently as my odometer rolled over to 52 years in November, my brain developed some leaky spots. I’ve been fooled twice by warmer days and twice have watched in shock as ice and snow frosted everything over again! No more! I’m just not looking outside anymore until after Mother’s Day. To maintain this resolution, I’m making a bright yellow baby blanket and then a poppy colored cotton ruana. In other words, I’m having blooming Spring indoors! More ways than one to be happy, right?

  49. Take the bull by the horns, wade out and clip some forsythia branches and bring them in, set them in water and let the warmth in your house make your own spring.

  50. Dear, dear, you Canadians kept our winter hostage, is that what you are saying? Saturday was Do something for your country day and I chose cleaning tombstones and repainting the letters, so one could read the names again. It was 10C but a harsh wind made it feel like minus 2! But, the names of 19th century deceased people can be read again, only 60 tombstones to go now. Mind you, one can finish one in an hour and a half!. This weather gives you an excuse to stay inside, love the tulips and knit, because outside can wait for better weather. The stench in the fridge? Have you checked with a toothpick the little hole which drains condens away at the backbottom? I defrosted and thereafter cleaned three times and the stench still hung. Then I started picking around in that hole, ugh, yuck came out, I kept picking till nothing clinged to toothpicks anymore and the stench was gone. Now I do a regular check there, because a tiny bit of veg or fruit grows horrible and unseen stinking yuck in there, just trying to help.Because if all of my fridge is clean, I just hate cleaning what is clean already, only sometimes there are unexpected and forgotten parts it helps to clean first hand. Succes.

  51. Darn. I just realised, yesterday I cut off what little hair I’d grown since Christmas… I think Spring’s promises got me.

    I may have to buy those fresias as a consolation.

  52. Yes, this is the winter that is never going to end; which is why I started a pair of Possom gloves in Frebruary. I will need them before this winter is done, I just know it.
    I too bought tulips with the thought that they would bring me love and hope. 🙂 Mine are white though…to go with the outside landscape.
    My friends and I have decided to go to Rhinebeck this year and in keeping with the winter that has taken its grip upon us, I went stash diving and found the brightest and most wonderful project I could find to start in preparation…it’s a Philosophers Sweater in all the colours of the rainbow. Something inside me awakens whenever I knit it. 🙂
    Maybe you need to knit another little Tulip…they do tend to knit themselves, don’t they?

  53. And here in Central Florida, we are clinging to the temperamental Spring with our fingernails–in the other direction. For us, “spring” is an illusion. It’s merely a bridge before the interminable summer, with its 90-100 degree temperatures and a truly awful humidity of around 90%. Actually I think it’s like the height of your Summer, only it lasts about as long as your Winter. I don’t know that I’d trade you for the snow, but there are times in August when I seriously consider it.

  54. I know how you feel; temperatures on Long Island have been @ 15C on the weekend, then dropping back to -7C for Monday morning. 🙁 I made myself a Catkin in spring green and apple blossom pink to make myself feel better.

  55. Spring fever may have hit so hard because you just got back from warmer climates on your book tour. Arizona and Texas weather at this time of the year would make snow hard to take. Remember-good weather is just around the corner.

  56. What a pretty little sweater! Don’t despair. Even though we’re getting snow tonight, we have crocuses in Philadelphia. Spring is creeping north!

  57. I made Baby Tea Leaves in a bright teal last week! I knew intellectually how many stitches rouching required but the actual number shocked me, too, but the bright color made me not care.

    Spring will come.

  58. Winter will end. I live near Berlin and last year we had to pick up Eastereggs out of snow. When summer arived it rained so hard we had a flood. This year winter did not happen. You never know what happens. I startet knitting sock for my mother in law from a handpainted pinkish and a little leavegreen wool. I use an old tulip-pattern. More springish is not possible.

  59. As a fellow Southern Ontarian and a former Torontoian, isn’t ” It’s usually horrible right into April.” just a tad optimistic?

  60. So sweet – I love that pattern. Yes, I’m familiar with that lie called Spring. We tried to make it feel like Spring by getting an ice cream cone at the seasonal ice cream place that opened in Lake George. It was 35 degrees. But there was a long line! All of us WISHING it was spring.

Leave a Reply to IMLokismom Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.