So it turns out I like hats.  That sound you just heard was my mother gasping.  We lived in the mountains for two years when I was in high school.  I went skiing just about every weekend there was enough snow to hide the grass (and one or two memorable weekends there wasn't).  I never wore a hat.  I would occasionally (and under great duress) grudgingly consent to wear a little ear band to keep my hair out of my face and keep the tips of my ears from turning blue and falling off...but never a hat. Turns out if [...]

Well the title more or less says it all.  It's is officially looking like a hat now.  I looked at some in the store to make sure.  I've learned some things.  First, hats are full of mystery.  That doesn't look like it would go on a human head, but it goes on mine just fine, even before blocking.  And my head is very large.  Second, each round feels like it's taking for.freaking.ever, but the hat itself grows with stunning speed.  That hat in the picture?  That's like two evenings of light knitting (the slow and dawdling kind where you're doing [...]

I cast on the hat yesterday morning.  I have mixed feelings.  I am totally confident in my gauge.  I knit a damn fine mitt gauge swatch and measured very carefully.  But I still feel uncertain.  Sometimes I think it looks too big, other times I'm convinced it's way too small.  I think it's because I don't know what 'proper hat' looks like laying there on the needles.  By this point, I am deeply familiar with what 'proper sock' looks like.  I can tell within 2 or 3 rounds if it's going to be too big or too small.  Not so [...]