Early October

Early October and the light begins to shift. Sunset comes earlier. What we lose in daylight, we gain in the color of October skies. Some days, the bright blue stretches from rim to rim while on others the periwinkle gray backlit by the sun turns late afternoon into a painting. The maples in the neighborhood display with deep rich red while the locust and birch trees sport a brilliant yellow-gold. Walking in this season is glorious. I try to look up and outward so as not to miss the beauty. October is my favorite month of Autumn. 

After cool fall days, the temperatures are swinging up to 80 degrees this week. Maybe the last few tomatoes will ripen. By the end of the week, I will have clipped enough seed heads from the zinnias for next years crop. The herbs and pot of basil still need water. I will not miss the hot humid days of summer but I will miss the tomatoes and the basil. 

In knitting news, I finished the Downpour Socks. I enjoyed knitting them but never did memorize the texture pattern. I understood what the designer was doing but didn't find it intuitive. With the socks off the needles, the Frosted Lily Hat is my small project. The yarn is soft. I don't know that I've ever knit with Malabrigo Rios. Late to the yarn party again. The soft superwash would be a good yarn for a child's garment.

I continue to work on my daughter's winter shawl. Right now I am knitting the border. The long rows scrunched up on the needle look like a big blue blob of wool. It doesn't photograph well. I cast on a cabled version of the Easy Folded Poncho. The yarn is lovely and the knitting is peaceful. It is nice to be knitting on a project where the rows remain the same length. It's also a good project for this season. My plan is to stay calm and knit on. 

I am in a bit of a reading slump but it will pass. I have picked up and put down several books. My library loan of Riviera Gold by Laurie King expired before I finished reading it. That probably says something about my enthusiasm for the book. It was ok but not the best of this series. Maybe I'll request it again and maybe I won't. Page-long dialogues where speakers alternated but were not identified except at the beginning of conversation annoyed me. I've been rereading several volumes of William Stafford's poetry and following along with the Craft-Lit podcast book, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte. 

Ravelry Links 

Downpour Socks

Frosted Lily Hat

Poncho with a Cable

I am linking with Kat and the Unravelers on this autumn Wednesday and wishing you a beautiful October sky.