The Peep Hat

my first real knit project! woohoo!

Posted by dani m.

About

For the baby who has about 5 thousand crocheted hats... how 'bout a knit one? Hell, why not? Poor child, having to be born to a mommy with a serious yarn fetish.

I'm still working on gathering all my knitting materials, and quite honestly still learning knitting basics. This hat was a sort of experiment to see if the giant circulars I grabbed off the shelf could actually make a usable hat. Turns out they're perfect for a summer one, done in the cotton and bamboo seen here! Peep likes it.

It would be extremely easy to adapt the size. :)

Share

You Will Need (4 things)

  • 16" Circular Knitting Needles 8 mm (size 11)
  • 1 skein Cotton Yarn
  • 1 skein Bamboo Yarn or yarn of choice for trim
  • 8 mm Crochet Hook

Steps (3 steps, 100 minutes)

  1. 1

    knit with worsted weight cotton
    crocheted with bulky weight bamboo/acrylic. But worsted would work fine for this, too.
    *size 18mos - 3*
    On size 11 (8.0 mm) 16" circulars, cast on 40 stitches. mark beginning. Knit for 20 rows.
    Then, knit 10, k2tog, knit 10, k2tog, etc, until end of row. (4 decreases) Keeping your eye on those (or you can mark them if you want), decrease in same spot with each round - so for the next round, knit 9, k2tog, k9, k2tog... etc, then 8 for the next row... very soon the stitches just don't fit on the circulars anymore - at this point I switched to a smaller size pair of straights - 5.0 mm was handy. Knitting loosely, keep decreasing as before until you are left with 4 stiches. Now, knit straight into an I-cord for about 2 1/2", then cast off. With end string, attach I-cord to it's base or thereabouts, making something that looks somewhat like a loop or, as I think, the top of a hershey's kiss. So cute.

  2. 2

    I used crochet for the brim of the hat, all slip stitch, super easy even if you don't know how to crochet. I used bulky and slipstitch to make it a denser fabric. With 8 mm hook, slst into every knit stitch along base, but don't join stitches. at end of row, chain stitch 11. Turn. Slst into second chain from hook and into every stitch, plus 1 at the end of the row. (you're going BEHIND the other stitch here. You'll do this one more time after this, it's what creates the neat twist.) Turn, and slst around again. I created an actual buttonhole at end, but you don't have to. (fourth stitch from end, chain 3, skip 3 st, slst in last st.) Turn, slst in each st until last, then slst behind next (into the knit, remember) turn, and slst all the way across. Turn, and slst back one last time, last stitch in knit, and bind off. Weave in that end and attach your button. (I attached it in the 11th knit row up)

  3. 3

    This is my first written pattern and my first knit hat, so if something is written wonkily, sorry. Let me know if there's a problem with the pattern or something confusing, other than it being over-simplified.
    Also, I'm almost done with a duplicate for my 5 year old - it fits her very well and I did it by casting on 50 and using 5 decreases - everything else is the same. :)