A letter from a reader

I have wrapped up in a blanket every winter evening for forty years. This is the first one I have ever written a letter about.

Six things I have noticed since a cold Saturday night at the old drive-in outside Lubbock, from a woman who has spent more evenings than she can count holding a throw up with one hand.

Peggy Dalton · Customer · Austin, Texas · 5 min read

Let me tell you who is talking before I tell you anything else. I am Peggy, I am 63, and I live in Austin, Texas, with my husband Frank. I run cold. I have always run cold. From the first norther in November until the bluebonnets, there is a blanket on the arm of my chair, one on the foot of the bed, and one in the back seat of the car, and I am usually holding at least one of them up around my shoulders with a hand I would rather be using for something else.

The ones I am writing about are wearable blankets from Iris and Nora, a small boutique here in Austin that has been quietly dressing women like us for a few years now. Mine is the Pippa, a soft fresh mint green covered in little smiling avocados with tiny arms and legs, little dark green leaves and small red flowers. The other one I will tell you about is the Scarlett, which is black with red strawberries, green leaves and little white blossoms all over it. There are thirty prints in the collection, and I have looked at every one of them more than once.

Here is how I found them. The Saturday after Thanksgiving, Frank and I were staying with his cousin in Wolfforth, and the whole family went out to the old drive-in outside Lubbock for the Christmas movie. Out there you back the pickups in and sit in the truck beds. It was thirty-four degrees by the time the screen lit up. I had a stadium blanket around my shoulders and Frank’s work coat over my knees, and every time I reached for my cocoa or the popcorn, the blanket slid off one shoulder and the coat slid off my knees, and I spent the first half hour of that movie tucking and re-tucking like a woman making a bed in a wind.

Mine, on the tailgate the next time we went out. Cocoa in both hands, and nothing sliding anywhere.

In the truck bed next to ours there was a woman about my age, sitting cross-legged on a sleeping bag in this mint green thing with avocados on it, the hood up, a cup of cocoa in one hand and a fistful of popcorn in the other, perfectly still and perfectly warm. Her name, I found out at intermission, is Twyla. Her sister had a black one with strawberries. They looked like two women in their own living room. I looked like a pile of laundry. So at intermission, on the way to the concession stand, I asked her, plainly.

Two piles

I have bought blankets for forty years, and what is out there falls into two piles. There is the throw, soft and pretty and warm, which stays put exactly as long as you sit still with both hands inside it. The moment you want your coffee, your book, the remote or a grandbaby, it is off your shoulders and on the floor. And there is the coat, or the robe, or Frank’s old sweatshirt, which lets you use your hands but was never meant to keep a woman warm sitting still, and leaves your legs and feet out in the cold.

For forty winters I chose between warm and useful. I did not know there was a third pile.

The afternoon it came. I laid it out on the bed to see how long it was, and then I did not take it off until bedtime.

I ordered mine on my phone in the truck bed before the second half started, and it was on the doorstep when we got home to Austin. I have worn it most evenings since, and a good few mornings. Going by these last weeks, it comes down to six things, and I will give them to you plainly.

2

Warm from your shoulders right down to your ankles

It is long, about fifty-five inches, which on me comes right down past my shins to my ankles, and the boutique describes the feel as soft, plush and warm, wrapping you from your shoulders to your ankles. That is the part a coat never managed. Sitting in a truck bed or in my chair with my feet tucked up, the whole of me is inside it. I put it on over whatever I am wearing, pajamas or my day clothes, and I am warm in about a minute.

The Scarlett, the black one with the strawberries. Twyla’s sister was right about this one.

★★★★★

Our house is old and the floors are cold all winter. This comes right down to my ankles and I have stopped turning the heat up at night.

Bonnie K., Idalou

4

One big pocket right where your hands go

There is one large pocket across the front, and the boutique says it keeps your hands warm and holds the remote, your phone or a few snacks. Mine holds the remote, my reading glasses and, at the drive-in, a paper sack of popcorn. When my hands get cold I tuck them in there together, the way you would in a muff, and that is where they stay.

Both hands in the pocket and the cocoa set down beside me. Our second trip out.

★★★★★

The pocket is big enough for both hands and my phone. I wear mine on the porch with my coffee every morning now.

Carolyn J., Ropesville

6

A print that makes people smile, and a Christmas present that gets worn

I will be honest, I would never have picked avocados with little legs for myself. That is exactly why I love it. Every grandchild who comes through the door laughs and wants to hold the pocket, and I laugh too. The boutique calls them a cheerful all-over design that brightens up the coldest days and makes a lovely gift, and with thirty prints, from the avocados to the strawberries to dogs and cats and the moon, there is one for every woman on your list. I have already put the Scarlett aside for my sister Sue for Christmas, and I have told my daughter which one I would like, in case anybody asks. Twyla, for the record, owns three.

Mine and Sue’s, side by side, before I hid hers in the closet.

★★★★★

I bought four last Christmas, one for me, my two sisters and my mother. Every one of them was wearing it by New Year’s.

Joyce W., Plainview

The Pippa and the Scarlett, against what used to be on the arm of my chair

You can keep holding a throw up with one hand all winter, like I did. Here is the difference, laid out plainly.

About the price

Each one is $86.95, and it was $174.00. Every print in the collection is the same price, and every one is half what it was. When I saw that I read the whole page twice looking for the catch. I have not found one. It came with free shipping, it looked like the picture, and it went straight on.

The kitchen table, the week after. I liked mine so much I ordered another to wrap.

I will pass on what the boutique told me, which is that these come in small runs and the most popular prints go first, mostly before Christmas. Their words, not mine. What I can tell you from my side is that I have bought a good many throws over the years, and this is the first one I have not had to hold up.

And I do not trust perfect scores, so I read the reviews before I ordered. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars, which sounded like real women rather than robots. The same six things I have just walked you through come up in them, over and over, in other women’s words.

If you spend your winter evenings holding a blanket up with one hand, and you have a few women to buy for this Christmas, this is where I would start. Take a look before the print you want sells through, because once this stock is gone, it is gone. And if you are ever at a drive-in outside Lubbock on a cold night and you see two grandmothers in a truck bed, one in avocados and one in strawberries, one of them is Twyla, and the other one is me.

Peggy

THE WEARABLE BLANKET HOODIE COLLECTION

★★★★☆ 4.2 out of 5 from 300+ reviews

$174.00 $86.95

• 30 prints, from the green avocado Pippa to the black strawberry Scarlett
• Soft, plush and warm, shoulders to ankles
• Long sleeves, so your hands stay free
• Generous hood and one big front pocket
• One size, loose oversized fit, about 55 in long
• Free shipping

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