Day 5
So I finally gave in and made the piggy hat using the lamby hat pattern.
I figured out that though the hook has a bit to do with how large end product turns out, the main thing (with this project at least) was the yarn. I’ve made things before that called for “super chunky” yarn and I used regular yarn, but this pattern apparently needed the super chunkiest yarn in the history of the world. Even using the largest hook I own, the piggy hat fit my almost-8 month old like a tiny yarmulke.
So I unravelled the hat again, and set to work following the lamby hat pattern with the now-abused pink yarn. Now it looks like a hat for a human child, instead of some kind of demented pointy thing or a hat for a doll. In addition to that, it only took me a couple of hours to slip together, thanks to the half double crochet.
I also transformed the dinosaur mullet into a dinosaur hat dinosaur hat dinosaur hat. It was meant to be all one color, but the mostly green tail looks awesome with purple at the end. To finish, the pattern called for a single crochet all the way around the edge of the hat (tail and all), and since the purple was what I had, it was what I used. It looks awesome.
The only thing I have left to do with both of these projects is to make the ears and spikes (respectively) and fight with those. My favorite patterns are those that work together all in one piece and don’t require me to own a tapestry needle so that I can attach one bit to another. But I’m not expecting there to be a cute animal hat that is made that way, so I don’t mind.
My next plan is to start some party hats. I can’t wait to get my rainbow yarn out!
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Day 6
I didn’t actually do any crocheting this weekend, but one thing did happen that concerned me quite a bit.
My parents were in the neighborhood to see adorable grandchildren, and my father was bustling around fixing this and that, as he is wont to do, at both my place and my brother’s. He ran to the hardware store to get something, and when he got back, he announced that he had something for my daughter, and pulled a hat out of his bag full of purchases.
My first thought was, “oh no, he’s bought her something I’ve already made!” but then I saw it was a lion hat, with ear flaps complete with long braids trailing down from them, and I changed my mind. I’ve got quite a few patterns that have ear flaps, and I figured that if she didn’t like it, I’d be able to know in advance and figure out how to change them.
What was most worrying was the fact that she didn’t seem to want to wear it. I put it on my head to show her what it looked like, we put it on her 3 week old cousin, and on her sister, but every time we put it on her head, she’d yank it off and throw it on the ground.
I thought, “oh no, what if she doesn’t even want all these hats? I’m doing all this work, what if she hates them and never wears them?” Thankfully, later in the evening she was running around in the yard with her father with the hat on.
I was glad, because I glanced at a lion hat pattern and wrinkled my nose at it, mostly because I wasn’t looking forward to figuring out how to do the mane. Another thing I wasn’t looking forward to about this type of hat was the braid flowing down from the end of the ear flap. My sister in law suggested substituting a long panel ending in a paw instead of the braid. She made a similar hat, a bear, for my nephew that turned out absolutely adorable (although there’s not much that my sister-in-law makes that doesn’t turn out that way).
In the end, I was glad he got it for her. Now I don’t have to fight with tassels, I’ve got a better (and cuter) idea for the ends of the ear flaps, and I know she’ll like them.
Now to get back to work.
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Day 7
It turns out that dinosaur spikes greatly resemble party hats that are just the right size for a Barbie doll.
Of course, I was only able to make about one and a half of them because crocheting time intersected with the time I had planned to watch the tear-jerkiest episode of Downton Abbey ever.
But I held up the finished one with the main part of the hat and at least when I’m finished with them it’s going to look awesome.
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Day 8
My least favorite part of this hat making so far has been the little bits to add on. I try to keep thinking about how cute the finished product is going to be, but there’s no way to overshadow the fact that I’m going to have to tack these bits on to make it adorable, so that’s usually what is foremost in my mind while laboring over them.
It’s easy, then, while I’m meticulously breathing life into a dinosaur’s spike, to get distracted enough by other things to leave it for a while, days, even.
I’ve got a bag full of bits and pieces of different projects that need to be attatched to one another. They’re waiting for I feel like taking on the task, and if it weren’t for this monumental hat project, that time would be never. I knew I disliked making things that I had to attach to one another, but I don’t think I realized the extent of my distaste. I’ve pushed them all off to one side, knowing that once I start, I’ll find that it’s not that bad, and that I’ll go ahead and attach everything that needs to be attached to something else all at once and won’t have to bother with it for a good long while.
Piggy Hat Update: success (finally). Although I used the lamby hat pattern for the top of the hat and another strange “a pig goes to a party dressed as a pirate” mask pattern for the nose and ears, I finally finished it. Well, I’ve finished the pieces, they’re currently hanging out in the bag of detached pieces, along with the dinosaur hat dinosaur hat dinosaur hat, the teapot from the amigurumi tea set I started a million hours ago, and a cat toy I began making for a friend probably two years ago (a pattern out of the same amigurumi book as the tea set).
Someday I will be done with this stuff.
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