The Man Hat...

I just took this knitted cap off the needles.  The pattern is by Haven Leavitt and can be found here.  (The pattern is knit all in one color; I added the stripes.)  I started looking for a pattern after it got cold and Jared realized his knit cap--that he usually lives in all winter--had gone missing.  When I came across a free knitting pattern called The Man Hat, I had to try it out on the basis of the straight-forward name alone.

I really like the pattern.  I knit Jared's in a lighter color and on straight needles (I couldn't find my double-pointed ones), so I had to sew a seam, but the seam is impossible to see or feel.  I thought I would knit a few more for the boys for Christmas.  Since it is getting close to the end of the year, and one of my 2014 goals was to master knitting on double-pointed needles, I went on the hunt for knitting-in-the-round tools.

Here's where I made a mis-step.  The only round needles I had in the size called for were too long, and the store didn't have the length I needed either.  So I bought a set of interchangeable tips with a separate cable in the required length.  I cast on and knit a row.  All was fine.  But then the screw-on tips kept backing out of the connection and snagging the yarn.  I spent a lot of time and patience screwing those darn tips on tight many, many times (multiple times per row!)  I'm applying Super Glue to them before using them again...defeats the purpose of interchangeable, but so be it. 

And will someone please remind me never to knit with black yarn again?  The only time that  I've had to knit lately is at night, and it is so hard to see if you drop a stitch (or three).

But I successfully completed the decrease rows on the double-pointed needles...not without some frustration, but I got better.  So that's another goal ticked off the list.