A new stitch, a new hat, a new baby

A while ago, I learned a new crochet stitch. Actually it's an old stitch, but I had never seen it before. Neither had the woman who posted about it (that post lead me to want to learn it).

What's awesome about the stitch is that it gives crochet work a knit look. While I love the knit look, I do not knit; I tried for a while and failed miserably. Something about operating two needles threw me for a loop. Not to mention, my carpal tunnel was having none of it. Too much physical and mental pain to continue. 

So I picked up crochet instead.

I found this stitch, the waistcoat stitch via a Facebook post, which led to a blog post and a Youtube video. Excellent video of the stitch being worked

Wonderful post with details about the stitch

I was hooked (corny I know). It is a great stitch for in the round work, though I wouldn't do it for back and forth row work, as it's meant to be fastened off at the end of each row and only worked in one way. This would be a lot of ends to weave in. Of course it's doable, just not my thing.

It works great for hats, and other things made in the round. I made an adorable pair of longies:

That yarn is from Lollytree, who has amazing wool yarns. I would spend a ton of money with her if I could check her out: Lolly tree yarn

Today I will be showing you an adorable newborn hat.

A few things to note with this particular stitch:

It can be slow going, it can be harder on the hands, and it is easier to do if you keep your crocheting a little loose. It is also helpful sometimes to go up a hook size from what you would normally do. This stitch does not have as much stretch as normal crochet, so you need to be sure your finished measurements will work for your item, especially if it’s a garment or hat that needs to fit onto a person vs a blanket or something.

It's adorable, but I do find it takes me longer to use than a standard crochet stitch. So be prepared for it to take a little longer than you normally would.

Supplies:

G hook

Caron Simply Soft: chocolate

Caron Simply Soft: soft blue

Yarn needle

I started this one at the brim and worked my way up.

With brown-chain 6, SC in 2nd chain from hook and across (5 SC) turn

**SC in back loops of each SC across (5 SC) turn**

Repeat from ** until you reach 12-13 inches in length without stretching it

Fold ribbing in half and slip stitch together to form a circle. 

This will be the bottom of the hat

SC in the end of each row around the loop, in my case I had 48 rows, of ribbing, which formed the bottom of the hat, and then 48 SCs which would be my first row of the hat.

At the 2^nd row is where you will begin the waistcoat stitch, working into the posts of the SC’s on the first row. Place a marker, and work in rounds without joining.

I included a picture of round 4, so you could see the stitch better as the brown doesn't really photograph well. See those adorable little V's so common with knit?

Use whatever color changing method you prefer, I saw an awesome new one yesterday, which is Ah-mazing and I will be adding it to my rotation.

http://stringwithstyle.blogspot.com/2014/02/a-new-way-to-change-colors-guest-post.html

Round 2: WC in every SC around (48 WC)

Round 3: WC in every WC around (48 WC)

You should now have 3 rows of brown

Round 4-6: Change to soft blue, complete 3 rows of WC around

Round 7-12: Change to chocolate; complete 6 rows of WC around

Round 13-14 Change to soft blue, complete 2 rows of WC around

Round 15-22: Change to chocolate, and continue until you reach the top of the hat, for me that was 7 more rounds.

For a newborn hat, we want 12-13 inches around and 5 inches tall, including our ribbing. For me, that worked out to a total of 22 rounds.

You could easily go larger around and taller, to get whatever size you like.

Once you get to this point, we are going to turn the hat inside out to sew it together, so remove your hook. Flip the hat inside out; re-insert your hook and SS the two sides together. Alternatively, you could cut a long tail on the yarn and whip stitch together with a yarn needle, your choice.

Here it is from the inside, in this version, I SS the sides together. Ignore all my ends, I need to weave in and trim.

Fasten off and weave in ends.

As my newborn is not here yet, I do not have an action shot, but I will certainly get one when I can.

You could add pompoms to the corners if you like, but I felt they were a little too girly. If you did a girly color combo, or don’t mind pompoms on a boy, go right ahead and do what you like. It’d be really cute with some curls coming off the corners as well.

The sky is the limit for sure here.

If I were to remake this, I would have made the brim blue probably, to help it stand out more. But it’s still adorable.

I love that it gives the appearance of knit, while being crochet. That plays right into my skill set. And it looks so cute. Can't wait to see it on a tiny little baby head.