Becoming a 'Hooker'

After completing my practice swatch and granny square, I was ready for a new project. I started searching YouTube for easy crocheting projects that I could make. I found one video titled “Make an Easy Crochet Hat” that seemed to have really simple instructions for making a beautiful and simple hat. I decided that I was going to make this my first project. I bought some Caron Simply Soft yarn that was really soft and easy to work with. I started crocheting my hat from the top down and the stitches were really tight in the beginning since I was increasing stitches at a fast rate (crocheting two stitches into each of the previous stitches). As I added more rows, the hat started getting wavy from the tension. The lady in the video gave me fair warning about this thankfully. I was trying to crochet my hat in my family room and I kept losing count of my stitches because everyone kept talking about interesting topics. I wasn’t proficient at counting stitches yet, so I ended up unraveling my hat several times, unfortunately. I complained to Brittany Campbell about my frustration at having to unravel my project so many times, but she was encouraging. She told me that I would get it right soon and to just keep trying. She was right. I was also unsure of how to join the rounds after completing each row, and Brittany told me to use a slip stitch. I looked up a YouTube video and learned how to do a slip stitch, which was easy enough. I did get it right eventually and after I was done with the increasing rows it was easy to just crochet the remaining rows using the double crochet stitch. I continued making rows in double crochet until I noticed that the hat seemed to be too small, so I counted my stitches and realized that I had somehow lost four of my stitches! Oh no! So I decided to add a stitch in the middle of the row I was working on, crochet two rows normally, and then add another stitch in the middle of the next row. This way I would gain back half of my lost stitches and it wouldn’t create a bulge, so I would be killing two birds with one stone! Luckily I have a small head, so my hat fit perfectly! When it reached the right length, I realized that I wasn’t sure how to finish my project. I emailed Donna and asked for advice and she sent me a link that showed me how to finish my hat. I am very pleased at how my hat turned out and can’t wait until it’s cold enough to wear it!