Jay's Summer Hat - 03

If I’d been living anywhere else, I think this hat would have been lost for good. I was almost done the night I lost it. I got home from Selma’s softball game, where I’d been working on the hat and I was changing to go to out to dinner when I realized I didn’t have it anymore. I scoured the house, and when I left, I had enough time to retrace my steps and ask around: the ball field, the Baja Taco where I’d picked up dinner for the kids. Nothing. I hate losing things, and I stewed about it most of the night.

Jay's Summer Hat - 08

In the morning, I went out and tore the car apart but it wasn’t there. I had gone out the back door, and when I went to go in the front door, I found my little project bag hanging on the front door. Special delivery–the bag had been found, recognized and dropped off by fellow knitters!

Jay's Summer Hat - 05

Jay had commissioned the hat and picked the colors himself. I didn’t have a color-work pattern in mind, I just started playing with color and the little circles evolved. This intuitive way of creating pattern is my favorite because you don’t have to “get it right,” you just do what seems like fun in the next round and watch it grow.

Jay's Summer Hat - 07

The hat is worked in back loop single crochet in Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece (thanks, Becca!) and three different sizes of hook–4.5mm for the crown 5mm for the color work and 3.5mm for the ribbing.

Jay's Summer Hat - 01

Intuition and Luck