Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Make Your Own Knitted Hat Patterns: Diamond Lace Baby Hat



My creative projects have been on hold as of late because of the recent birth of my son, so this is my first post-partem finished project! I had been looking at a few patterns in one of my pattern books and I saw a diamond pattern I thought might make a cute baby hat. The thing about patterns in books though, is that they are meant for straight needles, so the pattern on the left side and right side are different (and in more complex patterns the even numbered rows are more than just purl around and have to be reversed to be knit in the round). This pattern also started in the middle of the diamond pattern (making a triangle at the beginning of the pattern). Why would I want to do that, book?! So I had to start in the middle of their pattern to start mine. Nothing's ever easy.

Anyways, my pattern ended up as below (see chart). The pattern is based on a repeating 8 stitch pattern, so I cast on 64 sts on a size 7 circular needle (I used a sport weight baby yarn). I did a k 2, p 2 rib for the brim (about 6 rows or approx. 1 inch). I knit two rows plain before starting the pattern. After finishing with the lace pattern, I knit every row until the work measured approx. 5 inches. Then I switched to dpn and started the decreases: first decrease row was *k 6, k 2 tog* repeat around; then k one row; then *k 5, k 2 tog* repeat around; k one row; then decrease every row, continuing the pattern (*k 4, k 2 tog* repeat around, *k 3, k 2 tog* repeat around, etc), until you have 4 sts left. Pull the yarn through these stitches and gather. Weave in all ends.

A tip: double decrease is slip one, k 2 tog, pass slipped stitch over. And every even row is a knit row.

Hat shown is about 1-3 month size.

The hat turned out alright I think. Admittedly it turned out smaller than I intended and I also didn't expect it to be so feminine. Unfortunately, I only have one baby for a model, so that's my son modelling this girly hat. *le sigh*

1 comment:

Stacy said...

It is girly but he's so sweet in it. :)