The Pink Scarf That Became A Hat

One of the beautiful things about knitting is that if you find that you don't like a project, you're not stuck with it forever. You can frog it (tear out the knitting) and rework it into something else. Case in point is the pink scarf below. It came in a kit I picked up a few years ago for breast cancer awareness month. The pattern itself was for a crocheted scarf (it came with a giant pink crochet hook), but I wasn't into that. So at the time, I took the yarn (which is a pretty standard cheapo acrylic) and knit it up into a moss stitch scarf. It's OK, but being acrylic, it's way too scratchy on my hypersensitive skin to actually wear, and Ms. Thang felt the same way.



Here's a close up of the moss stitch pattern. This is also known as seed stitch. It's a K1, P1 across and then on opposing rows, the knit stitches are purled and the purl stitches are knitted. It's a good pattern for scarves because it lies flat really well and it has a certain amount of elasticity.

Today being my day off, but a week from payday, I needed a project, and I wanted that project to be knitting. The scarf had been languishing in the giant plastic bin that holds my fabric stash and other crafty items, so I pulled it out, unleashed the ends (first the cast-on side, and then the correct bound-off side) and frogged it and made it into a nice ball. Since it was acrylic, there was no need to take unkinking measures.

Then I picked this really cute hat pattern out of Stitch 'n Bitch by Debbie Stoller. The pattern is actually by Alex Zorn and it's called Hot Head (pp. 162). The pattern calls for stripes, but since I'm broke and had only the pink yarn, there are no stripes.

OMG, I love this pattern. It took about 2 hours all told, only 35 rows in the whole thing, and as you'll see below, it's damn cute on Ms. Thang. I'd wear it myself except for 2 things:
1. I haven't willingly put on a hat since I got out of the Air Force in 1988.
2. My super-short hair means that if I wear a hat, particularly in this style, it's unattractive to say the least.

I did put it on for a second, and Ms. Thang asked me to please remove it and hand it over. She's still wearing it.

I'll definitely make this pattern again. It's too easy and cute to be a one-off, and I have to say for my very first hat ever (and I've been knitting since I was 7 and I'll be 44 next month, and I'm not doing THAT math), I think it's pretty fab.