Stix Journal

Welcome back to our gift-making guide! This week we are featuring some great DK weight hats. I personally love making hats with this weight yarn; they are not overly thick but still relatively quick to make. And yes, I did give a thought to starting making some gifts of my own this week, but heck, Christmas is still weeks away. Ask me again in December. For all of you sane people who don't procrastinate, let's get started

Folant by Natalya1905

We used two skeins of Brooklyn Tweed Dapple for this knit hat. The wool and cotton blend makes for a warm hat which is very comfortable to wear. The texture of the yarn softens the lace design a bit....if you would like a crisper stitch Brooklyn Tweed Arbor or Double Sunday would be great choices. The pattern was a fun and fairly simple cable and lace combination, which I found entertaining and quick to knit. I would definitely make another of these hats! Pattern is available in the shop or on Ravelry.

Amore Beanie by Jeananne Atthowe 

Crocheting with Juicy DK is a delight! The Woodsman shade we used here is new to us at Stix, and we love it! It's not quite brown, not quite rose, with lots of mysterious flecks sprinkled throughout. Our inventory of Juicy Dk is great right now, loads of solids and speckles to choose from; this hat takes one skein. We are calling this pattern intermediate level crochet; you'll need to know how to make a foundation half-double and be familiar with front-post double crochets. We topped it with one our new faux fur poms. Pattern is available in the shop or on Ravelry.

Dyea by Boyland Knitworks

This is the hat you will knit for the person you love the most. Lang Cashmere Light is a majority cashmere yarn which is so soft you can hardly even tell you are holding it in your hands. Seriously, you have to at least come in and feel this yarn. This hat took 3 shades of yarn, calling for 2 balls of the main color and one each of the contrasts. After making it, Cameron feels that if you made just one little tweak to the color work section of the design, you could easily get away with just one ball of the main color. We are not even going to try to recommend substitutes for this yarn, because there aren't any 😉. Treat your hands to a knitting delicacy and your giftee to the softest hat they will ever wear! If you are able to part with it, that is. Pattern available in store or on Ravelry.

Lark in the Willow by Mon Petit Violon

This crochet beanie is a very simple way to incorporate different colors into a hat. We used Brooklyn Tweed Arbor for ours, but it would be great with Dapple, Double Sunday, or Harrisville Daylights and/or Nightshades as well. I really like this unisex design because of the deep ribbed cuff which is super warm, as well as the decorative decrease design at the crown. The ribbing is achieved by working into the third loop of the half-double crochet. The third loop is unique to the half-double and very under utilized for the great texture it offers. Give this hat a try, it's addictive! You'll need one (or two, depending on size) skeins of Arbor for the cuff, one for the crown, and odds and ends for the flecks of color, and the pattern is available in-store or on Ravelry.

The Hipster Hat by Petiteknit

The guide wouldn't feel complete without at least one hat from Petiteknit! The Hipster is great for men or women, easy to knit and easy to wear. The decrease pattern at the top is what makes this hat special, we love the way the ribs run into each other as they disappear. You can choose either a single strand of Double Sunday (or any of the other Dk yarns we have mentioned), or you could hold 2 strands of Sunday together. Wouldn't it be fun to choose two different shades of Sunday for a marled hat? We think so! You'll need two skeins of Double Sunday or Sunday to make this hat. Pattern available in-store or on Ravelry.

We will see you again next week for the worsted-weight edition of our Gift-Making Guide!