Repurposing my sock yarn

I finally finished knitting the Cannetella hat on our recent trip to Texas. A trip with both plane and car travel time is ideal for finishing up languishing projects. After returning home, I blocked it to spread out the lace a bit, and then sewed the double brim up. Then I tried it on… and while I created no photographic evidence, let me assure you that this hat did not flatter my head. Fortunately, S1 proclaimed it an excellent “hair bag” for her voluminous curls, and now it belongs to her.

(You can’t see my compost bin in the shot above, but I just noticed that my neighbors’ trash can is in clear view instead!)

That’s a little better.

I used a 2.0mm needle on the ribbing and worked the 22” size. I switched to a 2.5mm needle for the main part of the hat. My finished hat weighs 85.5 grams and I have 33.1 grams of yarn left. That can go into the sock yarn blanket stash.

I thought perhaps “cannetella” was some type of pasta shape we don’t often see here, but Wikipedia tells me she is a princess in an Italian fairy tale. I don’t know if this hat is particularly royal, but it took nearly two months to knit due to the many stitches on fingering weight yarn (180/round in the main section) and the fidliness of the lace pattern.

So naturally, I started on another sock yarn hat right away. This is Sockhead Slouch Hat, which is the #1 most popular hat pattern in Ravelry for fingering weight yarn. It’s dead simple and that is why it’s coming along much more quickly than Cannetella did – I can knit on it anywhere. This hat features a deep, 4+” brim that can be folded double for extra warmth around the forehead and ears. I’m making this for my friend Z, who has even more hair than S1, so I added more stitches after the ribbing to accommodate her glorious mane. The ribbing is 144 stitches and I increased by 20% to 180 stitches for the rest. Z picked the yarn from my stash – it’s a moody mix of grey and purple and brown on the Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere base. Since I’ve had this yarn since 2011, it definitely counts for Project Stashbust.

I just looked up the green yarn I used for Cannetella, and it was also purchased in 2011 (at Sock Summit!). Apparently 5 years is the amount of time required for sock yarn to become hat yarn.