Monday, January 26, 2009

Imitation is the sincerest...

I seem to get so many ideas these days from blog-reading. I feel like I'm such a copycat! My latest inspiration was seeing this hat
at Be-Stitched with instructions at www.rheatheylia.com. I assumed this hat was knitted, but was surprised to discover it is actually crocheted. I was intrigued since it's usually so easy to tell the difference.

I find that crocheted hats don't stretch much so the sizing has to be more exact. And hats knit with a single strand of worsted weight yarn are often not warm enough. Plus I have a pretty high failure rate anyway for making hats that fit and look decent, but I really wanted to try making those cables in crochet.

So for a $2.00 investment (including a 20% off coupon), I picked up a skein of Red Heart yarn in a color that I had been thinking about ever since I saw this sweater at Loopy Lou's. (Scroll past the chicken scratch). Not exactly the same, but the same effect. It's called 'Flecked Aran'. Wool has a nicer 'hand', but is too irritating to my skin.

The cool part of this hat is no seam to sew at the end. I made it in one evening (albeit a long evening). I refused to do any frogging so there are tons of mistakes.. but I just think of those as customization. The front and back post stitches made the hat thicker so the single strand of yarn was perfect. I never really quite understood how to do the row following the cable row. It was hard to find the 'post' on the row below.

The beauty part is that this hat fits, and I wore it for a walk in the winter cold yesterday. I'm very pleased with this experiment.

12 comments:

Jane said...

Lovely pattern and yarn. So glad it does it's job and keeps you warm

Ranae said...

Nice looking hat, it looks warm.
Chicken scratch... My fav aunt would say that and us cousins use to giggle so much, the adults would laugh. A wonderul memory, Thanks!!
And also a big Thanks for supporting me.

Pumpkin said...

Love it! I thought it was knit as well. I wish I could crochet :o(

AngelSan said...

I agree with you, the internet is a very tempting source of inspiration....

That hat is very neat, I amazed my knitting mother in law with a hat I crocheted a while ago....

Daffycat said...

Very nice hat!

Stitcher said...

Yay! Warm hat isn't it Annie? I've worn mine everyday,lol!
I'm so glad you gave it a whirl!
I admit, that I too was a little confused with the rows after the cables. I think I pulled my stitches out and just stared & stared until I could see where the fpdc below was and went with what made sense to my mind. From there, it was like okay! I get it now!
I like the colour you chose!

staci said...

That is a darling hat!!! I see stuff all the time that I want (and do) copy~~it's the sincerest form of flattery, lol!

Mylene said...

That turned out pretty well.

mainely stitching said...

That looks like a seriously COZY hat!!

Olga said...

Wow! Your hat looks so warm!

Ranae said...

Annie, check out my blog
You Won!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

It looks great Annie! I am so glad you are satisfied with the result and feel like wearing it :-)