Slow Burn Hat

Last time, I was about to start the Jamie Harmon mystery reversible hat (scroll down for the hat). So what is this thing doing on the needles?

I realized that I need to get moving on making a child-sized hat for Knitters' Day Out, which is coming up rather quickly on September 19 (donating a hat is part of the registration fee). In addition, I signed up to make another child-sized hat for Stash & Burn's 7 Long project (project described in show notes for episode 58). Their only condition is that the yarn be very soft, and also machine-washable.

This is stash yarn left over from making a baby poncho for my niece, who was born about a year ago. It's from Tess' Designer Yarns (purchased at MDSW '07) and is the superwash merino petite. The colorway wasn't marked, but I think it's "peach melba." I knit the baby poncho on a size US 2 (3 mm) needle. I recently lent those needles to my neighbor, who is learning to knit socks, so for this hat I went down to a 2.75 mm needle. I used this universal hat pattern and calculated a cast-on number of 120.

Hey wait, this really isn't a quick stashbusting project - this is gonna take some time! It's still a stashbuster, though. I'm knitting the brim in uneven rib (yup, same stitch pattern that I'm using for the Marine Pool socks) and it will be long enough to fold up. Then the main part of the hat will be stockinette, with a perky little pom pom on top. I hope this hat will be just right for some little girl. (Let's face it, it's a girl hat.)

I just realized you can glimpse my square foot garden there in the background (or, as my kids say, "the square garden"). That one tomato plant is so heavy it's pulling down the steel spiral support.