Cotton Hat with Spirals

Sally's head is smaller than mine, or possibly smaller than any average adult woman's.

I wanted something to throw on over dirty or just-washed hair that would be cool for the summer. I recently made a couple of hats from a lace-edged chemo hat pattern that uses worsted yarn. The yarn I used is Lion Brand Nature's Choice Organic Cotton (now discontinued). It is classified as a worsted, but it is fluffier than Lily Sugar and Cream, so it knits looser. I cast on 84 stitches and placed markers every 14 stitches, just like the lace-edged hats using the Lily worsted cotton.

I started out with a seed stitch brim for stability. After 4 rows of seed, I did an eyelet row (k2 tog, YO, k2 tog, etc.) followed by another three rows of seed and a purl row.

Then I worked the hat around doing [K2, {YO, K2tog} 6 times] in each 14-stitch section. The solid K2s give a dense area between each holey section. With the fluffy yarn, the holes aren't very large. With the lumpiness of the yarn, the seed stitch is not very distinct, either.

Because there are dense sections, the spiraling nature of knitting in the round is very obvious, and I kind of liked that.

When I got to the decreases about 5 3/4" above the bottom edge of the brim, I replaced the K2 with K2tog 2 times, and did the usual K2, YO, K2tog to the end of each marked section on the rows in between.

I regretted the eyelet row in the brim almost immediately, but I didn't want to rip it out. It turned out to be useful.

Since the hat is too loose, I crocheted a chain and threaded it through the eyelet holes and tied it in a bow on the inside, snugging up the hat a little bit, and filling in the eyelets. This is the hat inside-out showing the crochet chain and the bow. I'm putting this one in the disaster averted column.