handmade by stefanie

After knitting a Force Awakens hat for my husband Tyler, I thought I'd take a crack at making a baby-sized version using fingering weight yarn and smaller needles - and I'm happy to report that it worked out quite well! I used the same number of cast on stitches specified in the pattern to make this pint-sized version using three different fingering weight yarns in my stash. Here is Tyler's hat to give you a sense of scale: ICYMI, the Force Awakens hat is a free pattern here on Ravelry . May the Force be with you!

For me, 2016 will most likely be the Year of the Hat. There are so many great patterns in my knitting library, and I am determined to shop from my stash and knit as many as possible this year since they are fun, useful and - most importantly - instant gratification. Over the weekend, I started a chunky weight hat when I needed a break from all of the teeny tiny yarn and needles from my current WIPs. The Library of Congress Hat from Tanis Gray's Capitol Knits was a super quick knit on size 9 needles: I also finished Tyler's Force Awakens hat , which he is pretty psyched about. Since I added in a fourth color and opted to cut yarn instead of carrying it up the inside, there were a lot of ends to weave it, but I think it was worth the effort. And as you can see, he is already enjoying it immensely! Also, for anyone who has an excess of hats looking for a good home, there is a collection happening right now for the 25,000 Tuques Project, which I discovered via the Knitmore G...

I have to say, I'm really enjoying the instant-gratification projects I've been working on lately. It's a nice balance to my currently longterm project that's on the needles, the Snowflake Cowl . I'm now about halfway through the fourth chart repeat and this is starting to look....like a cowl! I also joined the dark side (or maybe it's the light side??) and cast on for a Force Awakens hat for Tyler. He's pretty psyched for me to finish this one, I think. I ended up starting another hat project so that I could have something simple on the needles that I could work on outside of the house - colorwork and mass transit generally don't mix. So I cast on for a super simple hat with this pretty new skein of Manos Alegria that hopped into my shopping cart when I was buying some Cascade Eco+ on closeout with my Webs gift card. And that crocheted snowman wall hanging continues to elude me! I have a few more pieces this week, but I need to get him finis...