Our friend, Denise (“Denni”) went gaga over the Anemone Hats that I made for myself earlier this year, so I decided to knit her one as a surprise and “thank you” for leading our weekly Sierra Club hikes. I ordered the yarn from Deramores – James C. Brett “Marble Chunky” which comes in a very generous 200 gram ball. This colorway MC16 looked a lot lighter in the picture on the Deramores web site. I was a bit disappointed in the colorway when I received it, but it still looks nice with Denni’s blonde hair. And the best part is that she absolutely loved her new ensemble. In fact, she wore both hat and cowl last night (6/23/12) during our viewing of Part 1: “The Hatfields and the McCoys”, a recent TV miniseries starring Kevin Costner. We had a sudden return of cold weather here in the SF Bay Area yesterday, including some rain.

I’ve discovered something about British yarn, having purchased quite a bit of it over the past year. They don’t seem as heavy compared to yarns of the same labeled weight made in the US. Here’s what I’ve experienced:

British “Chunky” = US worsted weight
British “Aran” = US DK weight
British “DK” weight = US sport weight which is a bit finer than US DK weight

Perhaps it’s just the particular Sirdar, James C. Brett and King Cole yarns that I happened to choose. Anyway, the bonus of the British yarn being slightly finer is that it all has fabulous yardage. I could hardly believe that I made an “Arctic Anemone Hat” and “Bandana Cowl” from one ball with yarn left over!

You may purchase Cat Bordhi’s “Anemone Hat” pattern for $7. by clicking on the “here” link on this Web page:

http://catbordhi.com/patterns/anenome-hats-for-children-a...

The pattern covers all sizes from baby through adult, and has two styles – the “Everyday Anemone Hat” (worsted weight yarn) and the “Arctic Anemone Hat” (chunky yarn with more closely spaced tendrils).
Or you may be clever enough to create a similar hat yourself by watching Cat Bordhi’s helpful short videos:

How to knit a moebius brim:

http://tinyurl.com/3k2gt3

How to make tendrils:

http://tinyurl.com/6z2bake

Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-Off:

http://tinyurl.com/3z6haza

I LOVE this bind off, and even used it for the neck bind-off in this “Bandana Cowl”. For the neck bind-off, I used the same size 10.5 inch (US) needles that I used to make the scarf. You don’t need to increase your needle size (as the pattern recommends), because this type of bind-off is so stretchy. It doesn’t look stretched out though. That’s what’s great about it.

This is the third time I’ve made Cat Bordhi’s “Anemone Hat”, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. Each time I’ve tried something a little different. Denni’s hat was the second largest adult size, because the two largest ones I made for myself were far too voluminous for her smaller head and fine, straight hair. Although I made an “Arctic Anemone Hat” for Denni, I decided not to do the moebius brim for two reasons. First, I found that I don’t really like the moebius as much with the heavier yarn, and I ended up wearing my moebius in back where it doesn’t even show. I do however like the picot edging. So for Denni’s hat, I did a provisional cast-on of 50 stitches using size 9 (US) needles. I knitted the brim rows with size 9 circular needles, changing to size 10 (US) needles for the crown/tendril part of the hat. After that, I went back and picked up the provisional stitches, knitting the picot edge with size 9 (US) needles per the pattern instructions. Next time I think I’ll just do a “picot edge cast-on” instead of the provisional stitch approach. You can view many types of picot cast-ons on YOUTUBE.

The free “Bandana Cowl” pattern can be found here:

http://www.purlbee.com/bandana-cowl/

I added the fringe along the lower edge to compliment the Anemone Hat. This twisted fringe technique is identical to how I made the hat tendrils. The only difference is that I used a size E/4 (US) crochet hook to add the fringe to the bottom edge after the entire Bandana Cowl had been completed. I used size 10.5 inch (US) circular knitting needles for the body of the cowl. This cowl pattern is very easy, though you do have to know how to do short rows (wrap and turn) to make the triangular area between the point and the neck. The Bandana Cowl is knitted from the bottom up. There are numerous YOUTUBE videos on how to do short rows. Cat Bordhi’s videos are probably my favorite. She’s a riot. Whatever you do, remember to carefully pull those “necklaces over the ladies’ heads”:

Part 1: www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yVikAvPuE4

Part 2: www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFrVqx-iN7k

For more information on this project, please see my other post here:

http://www.knittingparadise.com/t-90440-1.html

I still can’t believe I made BOTH the hat and the cowl using only ONE ball of this yarn! Picture #2 shows the amount of yarn I had left over.