finished the hat!

What a day!  After working a long and hot (95 Fahrenheit) lunch shift out in the sun, all I wanted to do was get clean and cool and relax!  My hands still wanted something to do though, and as a result the knitted hat for my friend Tara is finished!

It turned out great!  The seed stitch was fun and the inside looks just the same so it’s totally reversible.  I added 8 stitches to the recommended cast on number and also went up a needle size from the recommended one (both because the pattern writer knits very loosely and because my friend has lots of lovely thick hair, although the extra stitches turned out to be unnecessary).  The hat can be worn slouchy, like that, or it can be worn with the ribbed section rolled up like this:

It’s still roomy this way and it is big enough to where either way it can cover one’s ears.  I thought about lining it with polar fleece for extra warmth, but I’ve never done that before and don’t want to try it out on a hat I’m planning on gifting (but if anyone has any tips on that, I’d love to hear them so I can try it out on one of my hats sometime!).  I think I’ll be working with my friend on Thursday so hopefully I can give it to her then.

This hat used about 3/4 of my 220 yard ball of Aslan Trends Royal Alpaca, and the free pattern can be found here.

That’s all for today!  Just wanted to share the finished project somewhere (I can’t put it on Instagram yet because Tara and I follow each other and she’d see it)!  Thanks so much for stopping by.  Now I’ll get to work on the CAL installment for this Saturday!