Here’s a hat for a family friend. Ricky is the eldest son of one of my dad’s longtime friends and if I ever met him, it hasn’t been in the past 10 years. Three years ago I knit my brother a red hat with a pom pom (he lost it immediately) and thus it followed that Ricky wanted a hat. He wanted one in black (or was it red?) with (or without?) a pom pom, and thus it was clear what I had to do: wait three years, and then make a warm gray cabled hat in natural fibers for someone who lives in Southern California.

Instead of knitting it on 4 and 6s like the pattern specified, I knit this hat on 5s and 7s, and added half an inch of hat length in addition to lengthening the amount of ribbing before the cabling. Most adult males think they have freakishly large heads but it’s really because hats are made too small in an effort to be unisex, I think. I also didn’t twist the knit stitches anywhere because I missed that part in the pattern and didn’t feel like switching over inconsistently. I love the hat that this pattern produces. It would suit anyone at any age of any gender and in the right color, can be youthful or mature.

The yarn is Elsebath Lavold’s Calm Wool which is 40/30/30 wool/alpaca/camel. I got it on sale, and it’s very luxurious. When I tested the hat on one of my gigantic friends (to make sure it wasn’t TOO big) he said he could tell that the yarn was a good quality.

Not much to say about these socks. I wanted to knit socks but I don’t wear knit socks because my feet overheat easily. Initially I started with the Hat Heel Pattern from Knitty and while I love how the heel looks like a little target with self-striping yarn, I thought that the gussets were an eyesore at the instep. I appreciate this pattern for its innovation but I feel that this pattern had too many ends to work in and that the gussets are awkward. Maybe something like a three-needle bind off at the heel could achieve the same definition while maintaining a seemless-looking instep? Who knows.

I used the Universal Toe Up Pattern with a figure-8 cast on (my first one!) and a short row heel, which I think looks very elegant. The yarn is Berroco Sox Metallic, which has enough going on that I decided to keep it simple (even ribbing was too distracting.) The yardage on this yarn is incredible; two adult socks took less than one ball. The socks are for my mother for her birthday.

The socks have shimmery flecks of glitter in them.
Here’s a little bit of trivia too: I have 10.2 miles of yarn in my stash!

I wanted to create something ugly. There was this inhibiting perfectionism in my system and I felt the only way to let go was to make a most hideous accessory and be proud of it. It looks like a bad tye dye hat made entirely of bobbles.
The yarn is a homespun thick-and-thin but mostly roving regrettably dyed with primary colors atrocity I picked up at a yard sale. I originally wanted to make felted beads out of it and because it’s dyed with primary colors I could effectively get all the colors of the rainbow out of it. Felted beads is still an option as I would have no problems unraveling this hat if I don’t decide to leave it behind at a hipster location in my neighborhood as a joke. I decided to work in crochet, as I feel that it’s very “forgiving” (imprecise).

I debuted this hat at my party last weekend as part of a discussion as to whether crochet is ugly (THIS PARTY ROCKED?). My position was that in general, crocheted garments are ugly because a crochet stitch has too much going on and that it’s best suited to borders, finishing, and afghans. Imagine a sewn garment made only of trims. To prove my point I modeled this hideous hat and it was declared that this is not representative of all crochet.

Whatcanyoudo?