baby, it’s cowl’d outside

winter has finally arrived in southern ontario!  it’s cold!  it’s snowy!  it’s sunny, too!  my overuse of exclamations is intentional – for i am a winterchild.  please allow me a moment to wax about my love of winter, which will be followed by a wintry crochet project, befitting the stirandstitchness of this blog.

becoming a winterchild has been an evolution (i know, becoming anything is an evolution).  winter in alberta was a dream for a country kid.  bolstered with layers of insulation and mitts on strings, we’d build snow forts, create mythical villages beneath snow-laden willows and skate and skate and skate on frozen sloughs.  i can see the heart-warming montage right now, can you?  the novelty wore off, as it does, with age.  frozen cars, dodgy driving conditions and fashion victimization left us cold, bitter and counting the days until summer.  this general ‘nonplussed with winter’ sentiment stayed with me until i spent a few years in the northwest territories, well above the arctic circle, where nonplussed turned to dread with a capital d.  add darkness to deep cold and multiply by six months – not for the faint-of-heart.  but here’s the thing: i started to like it.

thriving in remote places with extreme weather requires some effort.  you snowshoe and ski and camp despite the weather.  and when you move ‘down south’, winter becomes easy again and you start adding exclamation points to! every! observation! because! the sun is so magnificent!  the blue sky is so bright!  and being outside without having to worry about your eyeballs freezing is soooo sweet!

thus, the abridged history of my winterchildness is complete.  yes, i’m envying those who are escaping for a week closer to the equator, but i am also appreciating the nesting and creativity that winter does such a good job of evoking for me.  my creation for this chilly weekend?  a cozy crocheted cowl to warm the parts between the toque and the jacket.  i’m coveting a long, drapey, grey cowl, but i wanted to whip one up in an afternoon with leftover wool i had in my stash, so i needed snug and practical, and i think this little number fits the bill nicely (wow, so many commas).  i dig the random stripes and the earthy colours of the british and icelandic wools (two countries that know their way around cold and damp).  i used this pattern as a reference and modified it to my gauge.  now to christen it on a wintry trek with TDHH and the dogs!  exclamation!!!