Sometime last winter my friend R asked me if I could make him a hat. He had a particular kind of hat in mind — one that he called a “squid hat” because he thought it was shaped something like a squid. He remembered them from Vermont, he thought.
He was not referring to a “real” squid hat (and there are some of those both knitted and sewn), but a classic ski hat with a squid shaped top.
Always up for a challenge, I got to work. I first asked him what color(s) he liked. Since red was near the top of his list, I went with that.
I didn’t have a pattern and what follows is NOT a pattern. It’s more like a memoir: Knitting a Hat.
To get started, I looked at pictures of hats online and decided that I wanted the “cuff” to be doubled, so I borrowed a technique from a baby hat I made a few years ago, knitting for 2-3 inches and then purling one row, then knitting another 2-3 inches. At that point, I folded the hat along the purled row and knit two rows together to make a doubled cuff.
I continued knitting (this was all in the round, on needles slightly smaller than the ones the yarn manufacturer recommended) until the hat was about 7 inches tall. Then I started decreasing slowly (about every 5 rows or so) to make the top of the hat taper a little bit.
Once the hat was tall enough, I cast off, pinched the opening together into a cross and sewed it up from the inside.
I know it’s not really a “squid” hat, but I love the way it turned out. I hope R does too.
knitting a life 