Double Crochet Hat Tutorial

Hello crafty friends! I've been hinting around at this post for a little while now, and I am so happy to share with you my very own...DOUBLE CROCHET HAT TUTORIAL and PATTERN!!

So what you will need is a skein of worsted weight yarn of your choice. I really like Hobby Lobby's I Love This Yarn because its affordable and super crazy soft!

For this tutorial, I am using Red Heart Super Saver.. it's stash yarn that I really need to work through! ;) Super Saver is a little bit more stiff than the I Love This Yarn, which is really good for amigurumi!

I will be using a size K hook! Most cases, I used a J hook or K hook. Finding your tension is key to knowing what size hook you need to use for a project. A good place to start is by using what the yarn label recommends. Worseted weight yarn normally requires a g or h hook.

SO, on to the tutorial/pattern!

Using your K hook, create a slip knot and chain 3.

Insert your hook into the chain 1 space. ^Look at the photo. Once you see the two loops on your hook, pull the yarn over your hook and pull through the two loops. Inside the small round you just made you will need to chain 3 then work in 12 Double Crochet Stitches.
Here is that chain 3 and the first double crochet stitch. Do you see that small white space mixed with all that yarn goodness? That is the hole you should be working out of.
When you've double crocheted your last stitch, you will need to join with a slip stitch. To join with a slip stitch, what you need to do is insert your hook in the chain three space (as seen in the photo) I've aready pulled the yarn over the hook. Then you will pull the yarn through the chain 3 space and the last loop on the hook. In this photo you can see at the top that I just finished the slip stitch(sl st) and there is only one loop on the hook. So what you see here is your first "round." At the end of all the photos I'll post the acutal patter, and you will see that each section of the hat is worked in rounds!

ROUND TWO!

Chain 3! In the same chain(ch) 3 space (see where my finger is pointing? Thats where you want to be.) work 1 double crochet(dc)

Can you see the chain 3 space and the 1 dc? You will repeat this step in every single round, so familarize yourself with it! ;)

In each space make 2 dc all the way around. You should be able to count 24 double crochet stitches. Then join with a sl. st.

ROUND THREE

Chain 3. In the same space as ch.3 work one dc. In the next stitch work 1 dc. In the next stitch work 1 dc. In the next stitch work 2 dc. I like to think of it like this: 1, 1, 2. You will repeat this pattern all the way around. You will work two stiches with only one double crochet, then the thrid stitch with 2 double crochet. This is called increasing. Your circle will start expanding here and stay flat too. If you notice it curling up already, then you will need to frog it (unravel it) and try again. Make sure you are making the 1, 1, 2 pattern. At the end of round three join with a sl. st.

ROUND FOUR: Chain 3. 1 dc in the ch.3. space. 1 dc in the first three stitches. 2 dc in the next stitch. Think of it as 1, 1, 1, 2. Repeat that pattern around and join with a sl. st.

ROUND FIVE: Ch 3. 1dc in the ch.3. space. 1 dc in the next four stitches. 2 dc in the fifth stitich. 1, 1, 1, 1, 2. At this point put the crochet circle on your head like you would a hat. If it reaches the widest point of your skull (crown) then you will want to skip down to ROUND SEVEN. For my head and most adult heads, in my opinion you need to add one more round for a good fit.

ROUND SIX:Ch. 3. 1 dc in the ch. 2 space. 1 dc in the next five stitches. 2dc in the sixth stitch. 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2.

ROUND SEVEN: Ch. 3. 1dc in the ch. 3 space and each stitch around! (No more tricky increases!) This will bring your hat down like a bucket. From here on out you will repeat this step until your hat is long enough! Once I've reached my desired lenght, which generally is just over my ears, I like to finish the hat with one row of single crochet. It give the hat a nice polished look! ;) Your finished product will look something like this:

Ok, well not EXACTLY like this, but the basic bone structure! ;)

I am planning on writing up a full Fox Hat pattern for my etsy & for ravelry! I've received really good response from my etsy store from customers buying fox hats! It makes me super excited that I'm getting orders often!!

Here is the written hat pattern!


Using a K hook. Make a slip knot and chain 3. Join with sl. st.
Round 1: Chain 3. Work 12 dc in the sl. st. round. Join with a sl. st. in the ch. 3 space

Round 2: Ch 3. Dc 1 in the same ch.3 space. Dc 2 in each stitch around. Join with a sl. st. to the chain 3 space.

Round 3: Chain 3. Dc 1 in the same space. *Dc 1 in the next two stitches. Dc 2 in the next (third) stitch. (1, 1, 2)*. Repeat **Join with sl. st

Round 4: Ch 3. Dc 1 in the same space. *Dc 1 in the next three stitches. Dc 2 in the next (fourth) stitch. (1, 1, 1, 2)*. Repeat ** around and join with sl. st. to the chain 3 space.

Round 5: Chain 3. Dc 1 in the same space. *Dc 1 in the next four stitches. Dc 2 in the next (fifth stitch (1, 1, 1, 1, 2)*. Repeat ** around. Join with sl. st. to the chain 3 space.

Round 6: Chain 3. Dc 1 in the same space. *Dc 1 in the next five stitches. Dc 2 in the next (sixth) stitch (1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2)*. Repeat ** around. Join with sl st. to the chain 3 space.

Round 7-14: Chain 3. Dc in each stitch around. Join with a sl st to the chain 3 space.

Round 15: Chain 1. SC in each stitch around. Join with a sl. st. to the chain 1 space. Cut the yarn and leave about 4" for finishing. Yarn over and pull yarn through the sl. st. loop. Weave in the ends.

There you have it!! If you find any problems with the pattern or if you run into some difficulty, shoot me an email.. I'll be happy to help you out! You can send those emails to heatherxdawn@gmail.com

I hope it's easy enough to understand! If you don't know how to crochet but want to begin... you can totally do it! There are a ton of GREAT tutorials online and great books out there that you can research! If I could teach myself to crochet, then you can too!! Best Luck!

Blah Fizzle

This week has kind of been blah fizzle. I've been super exausted lately and I'm not quite sure why.

So, it's funny to me that the best part of my week so far was last night. We watched Easy A last night with the fam... it was HALIROUS! I love Emma Stone! I think she is just the coolest! She's so gorgeous too!

So, I guess this is going to be a "girl crush" post! Lol!

Intellectual Hilarity! check!

making crazy faces. check.

glitter letters. check.

super killer leather jacket. check.

Am I super envious? Check.

Seriously... she's funny, she's a RED HEAD, and she seems like she would be really cool to be around!

I wish I were in a super awesome crafty motivated mood to stimulate all you crafty bits out there, but I am totally off this week! I hold still to the philosophy that this is the strangest, most depressing week of the year. I think I posted about it last year... It's like the twilight week, where nothing quite matters because the year is over and a new one is about to begin...

Anyway, I'm sure we don't want to delve into the blackhole that is my thought process.. What are you doing for New Years? We're going to watch Inception (AGAIN, yes, this is like the 5th time.) with the youth group kids, then have a Church lock in. Our lock ins are so funny... we don't do anything cool or super exciting, but we just hang out and play Sardines (a reverse type of hide & go seek. One person hides in the TOTAL darkness and everyone has to find them and hide with them. There is always one or two people who are left searching in the darkness for the whole group of people hiding. We play this game for HOURS. It's kind of sad.

So, I will be back on my regular scheduled crafty brained self once I get through this sludge I'm feeling. Love you bits and bobs!

Christmas so Good.

Merry Christmas Ya'll!!

I really hope everyone had a GREAT day with their families! It was so much fun to be with my brother and his sister today! We had a blast! Ate way too much food! It SNOWED! Can you BELIEVE IT! A WHITE CHRISTMAS. Granted it was tonight when it snowed, but still snow on Christmas in Georgia! It was beautiful!

I can not WAIT to get in to these!! The Hubs got me some "Nerd Fuel" as my cousin Daniel called it. And I think I will here on out refer to my books as nerd fuel! Love it! Hubby even got me TWO sets of Moleskine journals. Now I just need to save up the extra money I get for this
I've really missed my Journaling and getting these journals just gives me a lot of incentive! So, if anyone is feeling generous *wink wink!* I'm sure I'll be in the class though.

I've been using my new camera too! I LOVE IT! I put it to really good use! Here's a preview of whats to come on the blog! Maybe a pattern and tutorial for some adorbable crochet goods?

Ooh, wee. What could it be? Just wait and you will see! Get those crochet hooks ready, cause I am so excited to do my first *ahem*FIRST*ahem* tutorial. ;)

Love you all! I hope your Christmas is lovely and wonderful and filled with Great and Mighty Love.

Life isn't a Norman Rockwell

Hey guys! Are you ready for Christmas yet?! It's only TWO days away! I can't wait for my brother and his wife to get here tomorrow night and let the fun begin!

I know that this time of year is so much fun for people, but there are a lot of people that this time of year is really hard to make it through.

We all have our own ideas and opinions of what a "perfect christmas" is, but let's be honest- life is not perfect. If it were perfect then everyday would look like a Norman Rockwell, but in my life it is FAR from that.

I want to share something deep from inside me, if you don't mind. I'm making it a point to make this blog personal, and I can't be real with you and not share the dread that I am feeling about Chirstmas.

I used to have ^this family. The family who got together EVERY holiday, EVERY birthday, and EVERY Sunday for lunch at Grandmama's house. The family who acted silly and wild, but loved each other very much. You know, the family that everyone wishes they had. It's so easy to be jaded when you're little and think that everything is perfect. It's even easy to overlook things when you get older and realize everything is not what it seems. But it is not easy to deal with the fact that you no longer have THAT kind of family.

My Grandmama died and when she did the grief of losing her literally tore my dad's family apart. We got together that Thanksgiving and tried to make it work. Tried to maker her special, one of a kind dressing, turkey and secrect bar-b-que sauce. We tried to make nice and pretend like she was still there. But she wasn't. And without her the love in that family evaporated. She was such a special and unique person that all of us together couldn't match her kindness and love. We tried, Lord knows we tried, but it didn't work.

You would think at 19, you could try and fix that situation. But I was trying so hard to act like I wasn't affected that she was gone (something I still do and still deal with a lot.), I just went along with all the charades. Needless to say, I don't remember what that year's Christmas was like. But I do know that the next year our family was so at odds that no one spoke to each other. My dad & mom moved away and no one even looked twice in their direction.

It's been that way ever since. For the past four years my family has acted like children. Last year, my mom decided that we needed to get together and she invited the whole family up for Thanksgiving. Enough time had passed that everyone was friendly, but the bitterness underneath it all was still there. You might not have been able to tell from the outside, but it was there. This year when Thanksgiving came, we didn't hear from that side of our family. I later found out that they had a family thing without us. The whole family besides my dad and his kids. It broke my heart. It made me so angry. Still. After all this time and all these years I am so angry that they are so blind. If we can't love our family, then how are we supposed to love strangers? If we can't love our family, then how are we supposed to care about the people who are suffering in this world? If we can't love our family, the people who share our dna structure and blood lines, then how can we love ourselves.

I wish SO BAD, that I could fix this family. That I could peel off a giant band-aid and put it on the wounds, but it can't be fixed. Now, after this year, I'm not so sure I want it to be fixed because I'm sure they don't care about us the way I care about them. I hope God has mercy on us and I wish so earnestly that he would fit it. I've prayed for years and years that he would, but it just isn't his time I guess.

So, I wish I had that tradition back in my life... cause the holidays aren't the same without them. I am very family oriented and the only thing I can do now is surround myself with the family that I have here and the ones I let in close enough to be family. But they still don't fill that empty space.

Life Tremors

I read something today that was earth shaking.

Take a second to read it too.

26In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, 27 to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary. 28And he came to her and said, "Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!" 29But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. 30And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. 32He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, 33and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end."
34And Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?"
35And the angel answered her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy— the Son of God. 36And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. 37For nothing will be impossible with God." 38And Mary said, "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her. {Luke 1:26-38}

This was Mary's reply when an Angel sent from God told her she would give birth to a son. A son that she would carry all her own. She was a virgin. She would remain a virgin. And when she was faced with the most outrageous, jaw-dropping, miraculous task in history THIS is what she said.

Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.

A woman, like you and me, who was young and about to be married to a man who was of a King's lineage. She didn't say NO. She didn't try to wiggle her way out of it. She didn't disobey or doubt. She simply had faith. From her simple gesture the world was changed by her son, Jesus.

All my life, I've heard the Christmas story. I've even heard conter-Christmas stories. That Christmas is really just a pagan holiday that we merged with the birth of Jesus so that everyone could be happy. WHATEVER the reason we celebrate this time of year, I want this much to be true in my life: When I am faced with the craziest, most insane idea and task God has asked me to do I want to have Mary's reply.

Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.

To have a Savior is the greatest gift I have ever been given. To have THAT kind of Faith in Him would be the greatest gift I could ever give him back.

{p.s, I couldn't help but share this with you. Sitting in Zaxby's I read this and was in tears at the beauty of the Faith that Mary had, not only to give birth to JESUS! but faced with all the social constrains of that Day... I know I would not have had the same answer. And that shames me. God is merciful, though, and I'm so glad I read this. I want to be faithful like Mary, and take on the craziness and awesomeness of God's will. }

Crochet Party!

All my crochet people get your hooks out! We've got a party going on and you're INVITED! Head on over to Flickr to the Group heatherxdawn's Crochet Party!

JOIN the group and start adding all the things you love about crochet! Your projects, your yarn stash, your crative process, your creative process! And don't forget to add all your web/store/ravelry info in the topic Crochet Party People!

I hope to see you there!!

If you join I would love to feature you on meh blog! Maybe a fun post about a pattern you've created or the projects you are working on! If you're interested contact me at: heatherxdawn@gmail.com!

Add the button to your blog!

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Life in a Post/Cute Crochet Fox Hat!

This week has been crazy! We have a few get togethers over last weekend and went shopping. Then Monday night Doodle got really sick. Throwing up in her sleep sick! :( It's working its way through the family right now. Robin doesn't feel well and threw up last night. *sigh* I am drinking Ginger Ale and telling myself it's because I've seen so many other people throw up. But I don't feel exactly perfect.

Other than THAT. I've started a new book this week!

Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen. I am enjoying it a lot actually. Even though it is a teen book and Sarah Dessen is a teen author, this book seems more grown up. It's because the main character, Auden (which is a cute girl name by the way!) didn't have much of a childhood. She matured too quickly under the intellegence of her parents, who pushed her to succeed rather than have fun. That's a complete different world to me. Lol. Success without fun is pointless!

I made Becky from Strumpets Crumpets two adorable hats! She requested a child and adult size fox hat this year for Christmas. She asked me last year for Christmas too and one of her cousins got a little foxy hat! It wasn't as cute as these if you ask me!! I had a hard time last year with the ears, but this year they were so much easier!

This is the adult size hat, for Becky.

This is the child sized hat.

There isn't that much difference between the two. I made the ears ont he child hat a little more perky, just cause, it's a kid! It's so funny, when I was finishing the hats, Robin and Doodle were watching Milo & Otis and there was that adorbs little fox running all over the place!

So, Do you guys feel like this year was a good one? Have you stuck with any of your resolutions?

I've stuck with one.

Growing My Hair for a Year. This time last year was the last time I cut my hair. I got it cut to shoulder length to even it all up. I want to cut my hair now, but at the same time I want to let it grow.

Pretty Paper Snowflakes

I am really liking paper snowflakes this year! I've made a ton and have hung them up all over the house!

These lil ones are on the shelf above our bed. Which also holds one of my most cherished Christmas things. Can you see the toy box with the rocking horse on it? I've had it since I was a litle kid & whithout it, well, it just isn't Christmas. It's a musical box and it's so sweet to listen to! *sigh*

Don't the snowflakes cast such a pretty shadow?!

Here are a few more of my snowflakes hanging out with Heff the Elf.

Aren't these orange paper snowflakes amazing!! howaboutorange features a quick cutting guide for the flowery snowflake on the right!

I think it looks so magical to hang up paper snowflakes on windows! Especially, here when we don't ever have a white christmas (except that is snowed flurries all day today!!! nothing stuck though :{ )

They are super easy to make too!! I used this diagram for getting started!

I think I may be starting a Christmas tradition involving paper snowflakes! How cute would they be on a tree?!

Do you ever make paper snowflakes during Christmas?

Oh My Luce!

Brace yourselves. The pictures you are about to view are SPECTACULAR!

Lucy at Attic 24 has donneit AGAIN!

She is so simply perfect when it comes to crochet, design and tutorial making that is blows me away!

Here is her NEWEST TUTORIALS Crochet Bauble Decorations!

Stars and Rounds!

Aren't they divine?! I wish I could have made these for my ornament swap buddies! I think I still might! I still have their addresses! :)

You can read how to make these sweet little baubles here!

*sigh*

ORRRR

You can make your very own Star decorations!

Now, I have to go. I've got things to make!!! If you make/or like to browse crochet, you've GOT to check out the Attic 24 Inspired Crochet Pool on Flickr! It's wonderful to get lost there. So bright and happy. :)

Love you all! I hope you are having Fantablous Thursdays! The weekend is ALMOST here and there is talk of SNOWWWWW! YAY!

I am a Winner

Well, I'm not THE winner, but a winner none the less.

You NEED to go look at this GIVEAWAY! It's amazingly wonderful and dreamy. And I wannit. ;)

Cuppy is amazing! She featured one of my crochet cowls in her last give away! So, go check it out!

Heff the Elf

Meet Senior Heff! My little Strumpets Helper! He likes sitting on the shelf where my paper snowflakes hanf while he watches us go about our daily lives. He's a proper Elf with a stash to boot! He most loves his pointy hat, from which he can hang if he so pleased!

Becky from Strumpets Crumpets sent Heff in the mail the other day and what a treat! It was kinda tricky to hold the teeny tiny edges but with my favorite glue stick and clear tape he's all put together! I totally see how paper crafts can be addictive! After all, I have been cutting up snowflakes EVERYDAY! Yes. I am obsessed. It's quite a stress reliever though.

I've been reading again! :)
I accepted a trade for this book last week and I am so glad i did! It was so good! I love the story and it is very engrossing! I can't wait to get the next book 'Linger' it is super cool and the whole book is written in green ink! GREEN! How fun?

Right now I'm reading Strange Angels Betrayals on my iPod. I didn't know it was the second novel... so um, I just figured that out while looking for a picture to post. wow. Um. I am kinda distrubed right now. I mean I was a little lost in some of the referencecs, but I just figured it would all be spelled out later... ha. Well, I'm really into this one and now I'm not quite sure what to do. Read the first one or just keep reading the second. Geez. I'm a nut case. LOL.