Pokemon headwear

I thought it was high time for some new crochet hats for the residents of Tea Towers. After much pattern searching it seems that Pokemon are still very much in Emily and Sam's hearts so I started on a Pikachu hat for the cheeky one.

Emily kept me on target to get it finished with daily challenges that she set each night before she went to sleep - 'Mummy tonight I want you to finish ...'

She was also very clear about the level of detail she required and made sure to check in with me that I had all the materials I needed - 'Don't forget that you need red wool for the cheeks..', 'it needs to have brown stripes on the back Mummy, don't forget'.

Sam took a lot longer to decide on what he wanted. He still wears the crochet hat I made for him 5 years ago... it still fits and is super snuggly and has almost become his trademark at school, so he only wanted a hat that would continue to be as noticed.

I think he is going to be noticed in this :-)

Over due blogging...

I've been sorting through the photos on the camera and found quite a few photos of things that I wanted to blog about... these two baby hats are from way back before Christmas - ooops!

This handsome little guy is wearing a variation of the stripped hat I made up for Sam 3 years ago.

The hat is so simple to make - it is straight across the top and then worked in rounds in a square shape. For each row you carry the yarn across so no need to rejoin yarn and barely any finishing up at the end. Once you have the size you want then just add two pom poms to each corner and you're done!

I also made another of these stripped baby hats for my little niece and though I really like the colours I much prefer the bold boy hats.

Easter time

Because I'm not supposed to be using my arm yet I've been unable to make anything to celebrate Easter this year. So with Sam's school Easter bonnet parade coming up this week I dusted off the impressively tall marching hat style bonnet I made him last year - restuck the daffodil centres and cut a slit up the back so he could just about jam the whole thing on his head again.

Now I love this hat - I had great fun making it last year and I was so proud of how it turned out. Sam however does not share my feelings for it - it has to fit very tightly to prevent the whole thing slipping off as it is very weighty, so every time he wears it he complains bitterly of how much it hurts...

Best do something more head friendly next year because if I get this hat out again Sam may well call the Childline on me.

Super chunky

As the weather is getting decidedly colder it was time to start thinking about what hat to make Sam this year (previous hat here).

I used a pattern from "Crochet gifts in a weekend" by Nola Theiss - the chunky ribbed toddler hat. Love the deep rib this pattern gives the hat, however it uses a ton of yarn so not only is this hat super warm, it's also super heavy!

Sam seems to like it and after wearing it all winter I think he is going to have stronger neck muscles too :-)

and if you see a crocodile then don't forget to scream - Eeeek!

What do you do when your son gets invited to a 'Peter Pan' party and he decides that he wants to go as the crocodile?

After giving up on the idea of sticking a load of empty egg boxes all over him thought about trying to make some sort of hat, and because crochet is so lovely and structural I got some green yarn and my trusty hook and made a start.

To make the hat shape I bought a simple green peaked toddler hat and spent quite a bit of time working out how to make a close fitting crochet cover for it. For the peak at the front I made a separate piece (roughly a semicircle) which had an extra 'lip' around the curve so that it would stay fixed on the hat. After joining these two pieces together and tacking around the bottom of the hat I was left with one crocheted hat.

Next job was to try and make it look like a crocodile... so I needed to come up with eyes, teeth and nostrils - while remembering Sam's instructions that he wanted it to 'look like a friendly crocodile so I don't scare anyone away'.

After spending some time browsing crocodile photos online I made some very white pointy teeth to go down each side with one being slightly longer in the middle (real croc's teeth all seem to stick out all over the place). What to do with the eyes was a real conundrum... the photos online showed that crocodile eyes peep out from the top of their head... to try and get this effect I settled with sticking some felt eyes on the front with little crochet eyebrows over them to try and give the impression that they were raised up. I also made the pupils larger than a real croc as I thought this made it look 'friendlier'. Last to add were some little crochet dimples for nostrils and the hat was done.

I'm really so proud of how this hat turned out - Sam & Emily both love wearing it and it has been worn so much.

Latest winter head gear

This has to be one of the simplest hats that I've made for Sam yet... it's just a rectangle shape with pom poms added to the top corners. To make it up was so easy (the hardest part was getting it the right size) that I'm slightly ashamed that it's taken me over a month to finish!

I started out with a foundation chain the width I wanted the finished hat, then I worked double crochet into the back loops of the chain, continuing crocheting round through the front loops of the chain and finishing the first row with a slip stitch to join. Next I joined the second colour and did a row with that (still double crochet) and after that changed colour every row. I continued working in rows (carrying the second colour at the inside so no need to rejoin the yarn) until the hat was the depth I wanted.

Now I'm tempted to make a matching hat for baby Emily...

Winter hats

It has started snowing quite heavily in my little corner of the UK, the garden is a blanket of white and I've been snuggled up on the sofa refusing to go back outside. So I'm officially announcing that winter has arrived and it is only fitting to show off a couple of new hats that I've made recently.

The first is another little frog hat (designed by Jane Bibby) from an old issue of Inside crochet which is quite quick and easy to make up. I adjusted the pattern for the eyes to give this hat larger pupils as the eyes in the original pattern scare me a little. I found doing the embroidery on the face easier this time too - perhaps practice really does make perfect?

For Sam's winter hat this year I decided to keep it simple and just make him a bear hat. I used the frog hat pattern for the basic hat shape and then just added two little ears on top to finish it off. Sam does quite like it, but would much prefer to wear his mum's cheapy free gift hat that has a monkey on the front of it - typical.

Even though Sam isn't as delighted as I had hoped he would be he does get quite a few admiring glances when he is out and about in it so at least adults appreciate my work!

Now I'm off to try and find an easy pattern for a basic men's hat - any suggestions?

Back in the crochet mood

Thankfully my craft block seems to be clearing and to help get back into the swing gently I decided that crochet was what my hands were wanting to do.

I really love making baby bits, they are so quick and satisfying, just a couple of hours of work and you end up with a gift ready to send to a mum who usually is just as excited about it as you are. The hat shown here is from another "Happy Hooker" pattern, this time part of the Sejia set by Bev Ireland. I had to add an extra increase row in this hat though as my hook size was too small (I really must get round to buying a size 4mm hook one day...) and thus the hat would have turned out tiny. I also just worked the hat in two shades of purple as that's what I had to hand, and I'm glad I did too as it matches the little two tone booties that I also made.

The booties are from "Crochet gifts in a weekend" by Nola Thesis and though I've made up the basic bootie a number of times this is the first time that I've had a go at making the ballet style version. Orinoco the octopus also loves the hat and booties and wanted me to show here how good he looks in them. Sadly I haven't got the energy to make another 6 booties for Orinoco so his other feet have had to go cold.

As well as doing crochet I've also been folding these pretty little stars from some cheap Ikea gift ribbon that I picked up last week. They are fiddly and time consuming but strangely addictive.

These stars are called Frobel stars and I first came across them years ago in an old girls activity book that my mum owns. You are supposed to make them from strips of paper and depending on what thickness you make the strips you end up with a large star or a tiny one. These are smaller than a British 10p piece and now I've made them all I'm not too sure what to do with them... too small really to use on the top of presents. Any suggestions?

Cluster of baby hats

After just a week of frantic crochet I now have 4 pretty little hats for the Save the Children "Knit one save one" appeal. With a little trial and error I did manage to design my own version of the new born hat pattern that was published in Woman's Weekly. In fact - I had so much fun designing the first hat that I also designed a similar second hat (you can find these patterns in the sidebar on the right).

The two patterns for these hats (shown in the photo as the first 3 hats - blue, lilac & pink) should hopefully be error free and are much, much easier to make up than the pattern that I spent a week struggling with. These little hats are now destined to be sent off to my Mum for packaging up with any hats that she and my sister make up. Hopefully they help warm some little newborn heads soon.

Save the Children hat

My mum sent me a pattern from her copy of Woman's Weekly so I could join in with the latest Save the Children campaign which is trying to get knitters and crocheters all making up hats for newborns.

I've had a number of problems in working up this pattern though - to the point where I almost tore it apart in frustration. The pattern is worked from the bottom up as one flat piece and then joined together at the end. The instructions for this are very confusing and the pattern's main stitch is working crossed dc's which I had not encountered before.

I'm very tempted to have a go at writing a similar pattern that would be quicker to work up and much easier to understand... for starters I would certainly want to be working this in a round with no joining together at the end. I may even publish it on Crochet Me so that anyone else who wants to join in this appeal can have a nice simple pattern to work with.

For a quick laugh I've included a photo of my first attempt making this pattern up - looks pretty bad right?