Halo

When I was a teenager, Southern women went to church on Sundays and wore white gloves and a hat.  Even then I thought if you were going to wear a hat, make a statement.

Halo, like my Top Cat pattern, says something about the wearer.  It says:

1.  I am fun.

2. I solve ordinary problems (cold head) creatively.

3.  I love color.

4.  I have a lot of leftover sock yarn.

The base is Malabrigo chunky—no scratchy stuff, just cloud-like wool.  It’s a simple basic hat with a few tricks.

First to keep it fuller around my full face, I cast on 70 sts (US#10.5) and knit about 1.5 inches in stockinette for a rolled brim.  I knit in the round, but you could easily knit this hat flat and then seam it up.

I knit the next 1.5 inches in 1X1 rib (knit 1, purl 1) to provide elasticity and some security in case of wind.  This also makes the hat fit a large group of head sizes and yet doesn’t squash you hair so badly.

From this point on I added the occasional purl row in order to suggest a place to put the ruffle.  I did every 5 rows, but this is just a suggestion.  In the end, I only used half of these and even put the first ruffle in a place where there was no purl row to facilitate the stitch pickup.  I decreased 4 sts when the mood struck and then decreased in eight sections to quickly close the top.  Obviously, if you need a bit more guidance, I will suggest any of the free basic hat patterns on the internet which use chunky yarn.

Finally I crocheted the ruffles.  You can knit them.  Just increase in every stitch until you like the way it looks.  I was in the mood to crochet.  I varied the rate of increase.  On the top two ruffles I did  6 dc in each purl st for the first round and 4 hdc in each stitch on the second round. 

The third ruffle was 4 dc and the 5 hdc for a looser ruffle.  Fourth round was 5 dc and 4 hdc.

Why did I vary the stitch rate?  Just to see what happens.

Worried about running our of yarn.  The gold ruffle is two very different yarns (see above).  If you run out of one, just tie on a new one and keep knitting.

Then wear you hat with a big smile.  Some folks will think you are stylish and fashion forward (Kate); others will assume you’ve lost your mind (Patsy).  Bestow your warm smile on each of them.

PS–Kate got the hat for her Bostom commute.  Patsy just got the smile.