Tiny Dude Hat.

So.  Tiny has a new hat!  And I have a new free hat pattern to offer you guys!

See for awhile there I thought we had lost the Red Fish, Blue Fish hat that he had been wearing.  Yes it's a hand-me-down from his brother but well... so is everything he owns.  I was pretty devastated it went missing - have you guys ever lost a favored handknit?  HEARTBREAKING.  Luckily we found it (under his sister's bed.  I don't even know) but in the meantime he got a new one.  There are some perks to having a knitter for a mother:

For the design of his new hat I started with the Dude's Slouchy Green Hat.  We receive compliments on it all the time and his brother basically lives in the thing:

So I wanted something that complimented and riffed on that.  Similar but not the same.  A brother hat.

BROTHERS.

So I kept the 3 row stripes.  I also kept the long, lazy, cable.  But I used it in a different way - repeating it across the body of the hat for a more preppy look.

 I also made this hat fitted.  He's a more serious kid and therefore needed a more serious hat.

I love how it came out!  And the two of them are adorable frolicking in the snow in their almost but not quite matching hats:

WHEN IT'S WARM ENOUGH TO BE OUTSIDE THAT IS... I AM SO VERY SICK OF THIS WINTER.

 I wrote up the pattern for you to enjoy.  Yay for Brother Hats!

Tiny Dude Hat Pattern

Finished Size:  8" wide by 6-3/4" tall or fitting a 12-18 month old

Materials:

Worsted weight wool for Main Color (MC).  I used Patons Classic Merino in Black

Worsted weight wool for Contrast Color (CC).  I used Patons Classic Merino in Bright Red

Size 7 (or size needed to obtain gauge) double pointed needles

Tapestry needle for weaving in ends

Stitch marker (I usually have the end of round break at the end of Needle 4 and keep track of it that way but if you are using circulars you will need a stitch marker to mark the end of round.)

Gauge:  10 stitches and 15 rows = 2 inches.

Abbreviations:

MC - Main Color

CC - Contrast Color

K - Knit

P - Purl

K2tog - Knit two stitches together, decreasing 1.

K1fb - Knit in the front and the back of the stitch, increasing 1.

PM - Place Marker

SM - Slip Marker

C5B - Cable 5 Back - Slip 5 stitches onto a cable needle, hold to the back of the work, knit 5, knit the 5 from the cable needle.

C4B - Cable 4 Back - Slip 4 stitches onto a cable needle, hold to the back of the work, knit 4, knit the 4 from the cable needle.

C3B - Cable 3 Back - Slip 3 stitches onto a cable needle, hold to the back of the work, knit 3, knit the 3 from the cable needle.

Instructions:

Using Main Color (MC), size 7 double pointed needles (or size needed to obtain gauge), and the long tail cast on method, loosely cast on 80 stitches dividing stitches evenly onto 4 double pointed needles.  Slip as to purl the first stitch from needle 1 onto needle 4 and slip the last stitch from needle 4 over the slipped stitch and onto needle one being careful not to twist stitches to form a smooth join.

Ribbing:

In MC: [P2, K2]  Repeat around.

Repeat Ribbing round for 1” or 7 rounds.

Set Up Round:

In MC:  [P1, K3, K1fb, K1fb, K3, P1, k6] Repeat around.

Main Pattern:

Round 1:  In MC:  [P1, K10, P1, K6]  Repeat Around..

Round 2:  In MC:  [P1, Cable 5 back, P1, K6]  Repeat around.

Round 3:  In MC:  [P1, K10, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Rounds 4-6:  In CC:  [P1, K10, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Rounds 7-9:  In MC:  [P1, K10, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Rounds 10-12:  In CC:  [P1, K10, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Repeat Main Pattern Rows 1-12 one more time, 2 times total.  Knit rounds 1-6 one more time.

At this point you should have ended on a CC round, and have 5 CC stripes and 3 cable crosses.

Decrease Rounds:

Round 1:  In MC:  [P1, K4, K2tog, K4, P1, K6] Repeat Around.

Round 2:  In MC:  [P1, K9, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 3:  In MC:  [P1, K4, K2tog, K3, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 4:  In CC:  [P1, K8, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 5:  In CC:  [P1, K3, K2tog, K3, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 6:  In CC:  [P1, K7, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 7:  In MC:  [P1, K3, K2tog, k2, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 8:  In MC:  [P1, Cable 3 Back, P1, K6]  Repeat Around.

Round 9:  In MC:  [P1, K4, K2tog]  Repeat Around.

Round 10:  In CC:  [P1, K5]  Repeat Around.

Round 11:  In CC:  [P1, K3, K2tog] Repeat Around.

Round 12:  In CC:  [P1, K2, K2tog]  Repeat Around.

Round 13:  In MC:  [P1, K1, K2tog]  Repeat Around

Round 14:  In MC:  [P1, K2tog] Repeat Around.

Round 15:  In MC:  [K2tog] Repeat Around.

Cut yarn and thread through remaining stitches, draw together and tuck in end. Tuck in the rest of the ends.

Here's the link to the Ravelry Page for the Tiny Dude Hat and link to the Dude's Slouchy Green Hat in case you want to make a matching set!

He is absolutely about to throw that at his brother.

Cobblestones Hat and a Question.

So.  I have a new hat.

It's the Cobblestones Hat pattern (link to my rav project page) knit out of some lovely Between the Pines yarn I picked up last I was at Yarn Cravin'.

I carried this yarn around with me for about a month waiting to find the perfect pattern.  It's just such pretty yarn!  Alpaca!  Sparkle!  I needed an especially lovely pattern to match this especially lovely yarn.  Eventually I picked the Cobblestones pattern for it's simplicity.  The basic knit / purl texture adds just enough something to break up the variegated yarn:

I added a couple of inches to the length b/c slouchy hats are all the rage these days:

My 5yo daughter was my photographer.  She did the best she could.

Which brings me to my question....

How do bangs work in winter?

Seriously.  I"m about a year in on this whole bangs thing and I still haven't figured it out.  Either my hat is perched on my head like so:

 Or if I pull it down completely I end up with squished, flat, terrible bangs.  Am I just destined to have bad hair until the weather breaks?  Is there some sortof genius hat hack out there on pintrest that I just haven't found?  Because it's -11 out there.  I'm not leaving the house without a hat on.

But regardless of the bangs squishing situation I do love this hat:

I supposed perched on top of my head is way warmer than not at all.... 

The Dude's Slouchy Green Hat.

So!  How about a free knitting pattern for a kid's slouchy hat?

 See way back at the beginning of this winter thing my dude told me that he wanted me to knit him a Green Hat.

Green, you see, is his FAVORITE color.  To the point where if it exists and it's green then obviously it is his.  OBVIOUSLY.

I wanted to knit him a hat that fit his cool dude personality.  So I decided on a slouchy, over-sized, rasta like shape.

Also as much as I liked the bright, BRIGHT, green accents in his jacket that color alone seemed too shocking.  So I added in the skinny, emerald green stripes to tone it down.

 Then I added in one, simple, relaxed cable to give it some interest.

 I love how it turned out!  He's been wearing it all winter - won't go anywhere without MINE GREEN HAT:

 And the combo of skinny stripes and cables makes my heart sing:



Since we're snowed in right now - which is the perfect time for Knitting All The Things - I thought I'd write up the pattern and share it with you guys. (you can see it on Ravelry here:  The Dude's Slouchy Green Hat)

The Dude's Slouchy Green Hat.

Size:  Approx. 2T-3T.  This hat is slouchy and over-sized.  It should fit my 2.5 year old for many years!

Gauge:  10 stitches and 15 rows = 2 inches.

Materials:

70 yards of worsted weight wool in Main Color (MC) I used Cascade 220 in color #8894 (green)

65  Yards of worsted weight wool in Contrast Color (CC) Plymouth Encore in color #477 (bright green)

Size 7 double pointed needles (or size needed to obtain gauge)

Stitch Markers (2 and an additional one for the end of round - I usually have the end of round break at the end of Needle 4 and keep track of it that way but if you are using circulars you will need one)

Tapestry Needle

Abbreviations:

MC - Main Color

CC - Contrast Color

K - Knit

P - Purl

K2tog - Knit two stitches together, decreasing 1.

K1fb - Knit in the front and the back of the stitch, increasing 1.

PM - Place Marker

SM - Slip Marker

C5B - Cable 5 Back - Slip 5 stitches onto a cable needle, hold to the back of the work, knit 5, knit the 5 from the cable needle.

C4B - Cable 4 Back - Slip 4 stitches onto a cable needle, hold to the back of the work, knit 4, knit the 4 from the cable needle.

Note:  When working the stripes in the round it looks nicer to use a jogless stripe.  There’s a decent tutorial on that here:  Jogless Stripes.

Instructions:

Using Main Color (MC), size 7 double pointed needles (or size needed to obtain gauge), and the long tail cast on method, loosely cast on 68 stitches dividing stitches evenly onto 4 double pointed needles.  Slip as to purl the first stitch from needle 1 onto needle 4 and slip the last stitch from needle 4 over the slipped stitch and onto needle one being careful not to twist stitches to form a smooth join.

Ribbing:

In MC:  [K2, P2] repeat around.

Repeat ribbing round 5 more times, 6 times total.

Setup Round:

In MC:  [K2, K1fb, K1fb] repeat stitches in bracket 5 times, K2, PM, P1, K3, K1fb, K1fb, K3, P1, PM, [K2, K1fb, K1fb] repeat stitches in bracket around.

At this point there will be 98 stitches on the needles.

Begin Body Pattern starting on Round 2 of Body Pattern instructions.  Knit rounds 2-12, then knit rounds 1-12 two more times.  Knit rounds 1-9.  At this point you will have completed 7 MC stripes.  Begin Decrease Rounds.

Body Pattern:

Round 1: In MC:  K to marker, SM, P1, K10, P1, SM, K to end.

Round 2: In MC:  K to marker, SM, P1, C5B, P1, SM, K to end.

Round 3: In MC:  K to marker, SM, P1, K10, P1, SM, K to end.

Rounds 4-6:  In CC: K to marker, SM, P1, K10, P1, SM, K to end.

Rounds 7-9:  In MC: K to marker, SM, P1, K10, P1, SM, K to end.

Rounds 10-12:  In CC: K to marker, SM, P1, K10, P1, SM, K to end.

Decrease Rounds:

Round 1:   In CC: K to marker, SM, P1, K10, P1, SM, K to end

Round 2:  In CC:  [K5, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket 4 times, K4, SM, P1, K4, K2tog, K4, P1, SM, K3, K2tog, [K5, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket to end.

Round 3:  In CC:  K to marker, SM, P1, K9, P1, SM, K to end.

Round 4:  In MC:  [K4, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket 4 times, K4, SM, P1, K4, K2tog, K3, P1, SM, K2, K2tog, [K2, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket to end.

Round 5:  In MC:  K to marker, SM, P1, C4B, P1, SM, K to end.

Round 6:  In MC:  [K3, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket 4 times, K4, SM, P1, K3, K2tog, K3, P1, SM, K1, K2tog, [K3, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket to end.

Round 7:  In CC:  K to marker, SM, P1, K7, P1, SM, K to end.

Round 8:  In CC:  [K2, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket 4 times, K1, K2tog, K1, SM, P1, K3, K2tog, K2, P1, SM, K2, [K2, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket to end.

Round 9:  In CC:  [K1, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket 4 times, K2tog, K1, SM, P1, K1, K2tog, K2tog, K1, P1, SM, K3, K2tog, [K1, K2tog] repeat stitches in bracket to end.

Round 10:  In MC:  K2tog around.

Round 11:  In MC:  K2tog around.

Cut yarn and thread through remaining stitches, draw together and tuck in end. Tuck in the rest of the ends.

And a couple of bonus pictures from back when we could go outside.  Before Cleveland became a frozen tundra and we knew about things like the Polar Vortex...

 Ugh.  I miss being able to easily take them outside.  I'll just have to bury myself in hand knits until spring...

Frozen Great Lake Hat.

So since Spring straight up refuses to come to Cleveland how about I finally post about my Frozen Great Lakes Hat?

The yarn is Destination Yarn Letter (my own handdyed) in the colorway Frozen Great Lake.  I've blogged about my inspiration for this colorway before but I can pretty much sum it up in this one of my dad's Lake Erie photographs:

Beautiful.  Although I am SO sick of our lake looking like that.  But it makes for pretty yarn:

And an even prettier hat:

It took one skein of yarn with a tiny bit left over.  My skeins are typical 100 gram skeins so that's alot of sockyarn for a hat.  Worth it, though:

The pattern is Ripple from Knit and Tonic.  I loved the pattern - hers are always well written - but I DO NOT love that you can't buy the PDF through Ravelry.  I have to actually keep track of where I save the file.  Boo to that.  However I love the whole Ripple concept used for a yarn based on water:

I was trying so hard to get a picture of me in the hat with the frozen lake in the background...

That didn't make me look like a crazy person.

It just makes sense to me.  I do like aligning patterns with yarn names, though.  It's kindof a thing.

The yarn matches the water!  Which ripples like the pattern!  I CAN'T HANDLE THE COORDINATION!

As far as where to acquire this lovely yarn - Destination Yarn the Etsy site has been shut down for awhile now.  I apologize for that.  But!  I'm currently dying towards Knitters Fantasy next weekend.  So if you're going to be there I'll have this and lots of other beautiful colorways with me.  Hopefully after next weekend I"ll get Etsy back in action.

Overall I'm really thrilled with this hat.  It's stylishly slouchy, the ripples break up the variegation in the yarn in a super pleasing way, and I tend to get compliments on it wherever I go.  A total knitting win!

Less of a win has been this weather.  Last year we were already going to the beach.  Seriously.  Monday I took the attitude of Fine.  If it's going to insist on snowing we're going to at least enjoy it:

 By Thurs. I was more of the attitude of I don't care if it's cold we WILL be outside:

They seem to be missing a crucial element... Except that they were pretending it was a boat so...

Today I gave up on spring and took them to the Cleveland Aquarium:



Our passes expire at the end of the month so I wanted to squeeze in one last visit.  Of course since it's Good Friday EVERYONE had off and EVERYONE was there.  It was crazy crowded.  And can I just... well... I hate to judge other parents but there was a couple there with 2 kids who were obviously older than both of mine blocking the way with a giant double stroller.  Um?  Really?  It's a small space with not much walking and your kids can't handle that?  Not to mention there are two parents - that's one for each kid.  But you need to contain them in a stroller?  And I get it... there are kids with special needs and sometimes that's not always apparent and you never know what a family is dealing with and you should NEVER judge because you just don't know and blah blah blah....

The Lion fish is not pleased with my judging.

Meanwhile I'm 7.5 months pregnant waddling through the place by myself with my 2 and no stroller of any kind.  And it was no big deal because SHOCK!  My kids actually listen to me.  A friend of mine told me that this third kid has pushed me over the edge and I no longer have any tolerance or patience for anyone else's nonsense.  I'm afraid that it's true.  Meh.

Red Fish Blue Fish Hat.

So!  Remember the super cute fair-isle hat I knit for my daughter when she was a toddler?  Here's the post on it.  Yeah I loved it so much that I decided to do the same thing for my son.  So somewhere about 11 weeks ago according to my instagram feed I drafted out this:

See back then one of the dude's only clear words was FISH!  So clearly he needed a fish hat.  It started growing pretty quickly:


And then... disaster:

Well not really disaster.  But I didn't like how the blue fish looked against the gray.  So I ripped out and started over.  And then I screwed something up.  And then a few months went by... and suddenly it was January, the temperature was set to drop by a lot, and the only hat that I had that fit him that wasn't a pink hand me down wasn't even close to finished.

KNIT LIKE A CRAZY PERSON!  YOUR SON IS GOING TO FREEZE!

Honestly all it took was one night at my Thursday night knitting group and it was done.  I just never have that uninterrupted time anymore to really crank stuff out.  It's good it's the only project I planned on working on b/c this amount of ends to tuck in would have been the end of me:

But!  Victory was mine!

And oh.  OH THE CUTE:

 I cannot handle the cute:

 So.  So much cute:

By the end I had abandoned the chart and was just winging it.  I love how the top came out, though.  The waves swirl around to the top.  So, so happy with how it came out!

He got to wear it for the first time on an impromptu trip to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo b/c it was sunny outside and not *as* cold as the day before:

I'm not going to lie.  I love the zoo.  Almost as much as my kids do.

My kids in their handknit hats checking out the lions.  The girl is wearing her Kitty Hat blogged here.

And if you go in the winter you get to see crazy things like this:

Lions spooning.  Seriously.  The one has her arm around the other one.

Apparently lions are just like house cats.  They might hate each other but when it gets cold out?  They'll cuddle for warmth no matter what.

The best part of this hat?  The dude loves it.  He points to his head and says HAT asking me to put it on.  And he says FISH when he sees it.  And he could not be more adorable in it:

Seriously this is my favorite picture ever.

Yay for kids in handknits!  Oh and if you want more hat details my Ravelry page on it is here.