Patterns, projects and techniques
This time of year it’s great to have some quick knitting patterns handy for last-minute gift knitting or charity knitting projects.
The Perky Little Hat pattern from Sharon Lentsch is a sweet hat that she says can be knit in “a movie and a half.” It’s worked in Malabrigo Rasta
, a gorgeous super bulky yarn, but of course you can use any super bulky yarn
you have on hand to make this pretty hat.
[Photo: Sharon Lentsch via Ravelry.]
I love to see variations on knitting patterns. It’s fun to see what knitters do with a designer’s ideas, and as a designer sometimes it’s fun to think about different ways that you could do things and change the look or feel of a project.
Tif Neilan played with this idea herself with a set of two bandana cowls called Variations.
These projects are both worked in five colors of sport weight yarn, and they’re worked flat in interrupted stripes of garter stitch in different colors. There is shaping worked in different sections to give it the shape it has, and you work a three-needle bind off to finish the project and join it into a cowl.
The bind off is meant to be visible, but since the rest of the project is garter stitch you can decide to wear the seam side in if you’d rather.
The difference between the two projects is their size, with cowl 1 being a smaller version and cowl 2 more like a shawl.
The first variation measures about 24 inches/60 cm around the neck and is 20.5 inches/51 cm long and the longest point. The second option is around 25 inches/62.5 cm neck circumference and 28.5 inches/71 long when worn. The smaller one uses 400-450 yards (402-411 meters) of yarn, while the larger calls for 655 to 660 (599 to 604 meters).
It could go without saying that this would be a great stash busting project where you could change colors even more often as you run out of yarn. But if you know me you know I’m never going to go without saying it. So grab your leftovers and get to stitching, why don’t you?
Both of the patterns are on Ravelry: Variations Cowl 1 and Variations Cowl 2. Don’t miss the projects tabs to see all the, uh, variations, different people have made!
[Photo: Tif Neilan]
luv the hat color???? this is my only gripe about patterns on computer sites If the maker would only say “shown using Mangor yarn in paqcifica blue” it would be great and we would be so thankful .
Is not free, unless I’m missing something.
I think it was a free pattern when I first shared it but it doesn’t look like it is anymore.
Sorry, not free. But very reasonable for such a cute hat!
Updated. It was free when we wrote the post in 2018.