Such as the Instagram feeds of knitters. And their styled photos with their bright colors and pretty patterns that they have come up with. Also, the tea cups. What is it with knitters and tea cups?!
Either way.
I ended up with a bad case of the crafting envy.
You see, I've tried knitting multiple times. And I can do the basic stitch okay and then get a few rows in and my tension is all screwed up and I can't get the stitches off of the first needle and onto the second. It just doesn't work for me.
But the Instagram knitting ladies...oh, man, is their stuff amazing (which, by the way, you should go see here and here). And, being as I was awake remarkably early because of thunder storms and such, an Instagram scroll was on the itinerary - and, just, the mental drooling...So many pretty things! Such tiny stitches! So many colors! So many things I just wanted to pet and caress! And, of course, all the tea cups I wanted to drink out of.
Which, of course, reminded me of just how, well, not awesome my knitting abilities are, as well as the fact that I don't actually own any knitting needles any more (thanks, decluttering advice!).
So, instead, I turned to Pinterest for ideas on something to crochet. That bug had been biting my rear for a few days at this point, but I didn't want to commit to a whole blanket. I wanted something with some sort of instant gratification and something that was adorable (because, you know, the knitting bug was because the knitting stuff was adorable).
Pinterest was, as it almost always is, full of the same nonsense. There are only so many ways to do a basic granny square, for example, but if you search, you will find a million ways to do the same square. That's just how the Internet works, and sometimes that's not so awesome.
I ended up finding a pattern for a hat that looked decent - which can be found here - and thought "meh, I'll get to it at some point today, maybe?"
Well, that time came in the afternoon, and I started out with it just fine. Until I go to the actual hat part. It was...not awesome. The band part, no problems. The actual pattern...just didn't work for me. Sure, I only tried it once, and only the first row, but from what that first row looked like, it was a giant cluster of nonsense. So, I ripped it out and decided to make my own way through - an impromptu conjuration, of sorts.
It took a bit of...figuring...but the end result was a success. Well, at least in my mind.
I wanted a slouchy hat, and I ended up with a slouchy hat. Also, green. Because, well, it matches my hair and my freckles and my skin and my eyes. Reasons, yo.
Also, I figured I should write down what I was doing, so I could share, and this is my...bad scribblings. It worked out, though. As well as keeping track of some of my ideas of what may work (which, none of them did, because I ended up with 62 stitches to do the pattern repeat with, which is not divisible by 3, which would have been handy - yes, I could have added a stitch, but I didn't think of that until literally just now as I'm writing this, so yeah...).
But, for those that don't want to try and decipher my scribbles, I will expand upon what I did.
For the band, I followed the pattern and then stitched it together at the ends to create the completed hat band.
Then went around and made 62 single crochet stitches to start the actual hat bit. Slip stitch into the first stitch, chain one, then continue with another row of single crochet (62 stitches again). Also, one more time (so 3 rows of single crochet).
The main body of the hat is 15 rows of this repeated: 2 double crochet together and skip a stitch. I wanted a puff stitch, but it just wasn't going to work for me the way that I wanted it to be, so I settled for the double crochet bit.
Then, to finish it off, I just used a yarn needle and stitched every other stitch together to get it all scrunched up.
Easy peasy, right? I want to say it was less than 4 hours, start to finish, but I have no proof of that. Could have been a little more. I didn't make any note of when I started, but it couldn't of been more than 5 hours for sure.
Also, the cold weather is on it's way (hence the thunder and lightning that led to Instagram in the first place - and that it is almost Fall, anyway), so maybe I will actually remember to wear the darned thing.
One can hope, right?
~Havok
P.S. Also, this is probably my fourth or fifth crocheted hat. I don't wear them. I never do. I make them, wear them that day, and then they go hide away. I don't even have the previous ones anymore. I just don't really wear hats - not my thing. But, dang, I am liking this one. I'm hopeful.
P.P.S. Sunday led to, well, the craft store and the purchase of some knitting needles. Wish me luck! :D
[Edit September 1, 2015: Added to Petals to Picot's Link Party]
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