Caller Herrin'

Three-hundred sixty-four days ago, I started this project-- one-hundred thirty-eight days ago, I started this hat:

Ahoy, there!

A seafaring hat must be photographed at the sea.

These were taken at Reid State Park-- one of my favoritest places.

Photos courtesy, as usual, my enormously talented husband...

... who never passes up the opportunity to catch me acting silly.

Project Notes

Yarn: Harrisville New England Shetland-- first purchased 257 days ago on a knitting field trip to Harrisville, NH. I brought home eight colors that day, to which I added four more back in July. The final color scheme: Loden Blue, Peacock, Woodsmoke, Tundra, Jade, and Pebble. This is great yarn for Fair Isle knitting-- the stitches loft up and cling to one another quite cohesively. I used just a smidge of Malabrigo Lace-- held doubled-- for the hem facing.

Pattern: Caller Herrin' by Kate Davies. I love pretty much everything about this pattern. The charts are beautiful and the instructions impeccable-- and the small motif is easy to memorize and easy to knit. Highly, highly recommended. I am in fact thinking about knitting another one in undyed Shetland wool... which is a clear indication of either devotion or dementia. I also loved reading about Kate's design process-- what an amazing talent!

Modifications: I did a sewn-shut hem rather than the knitted-shut hem called for by the pattern. I will let TECHKnitter explain the difference.

Etc: This hat was a labor of love. The actual knitting only took a few days, but I thought I would never be finished with the FINISHING. Making the Mother of All Swatches also added time to the proceedings, but was well worth it-- I was concerned that I would not be able to attain the same depth and subtlety of color substituting the New England Shetland for the Alice Starmore yarn called for in the pattern, but it ended up working out well. And I'm quite enchanted with the result-- the only thing I might do further is felt it slightly to fit my tiny head better. I could go so far as to say that this is my favorite hat-- which may be why I saved it to post on the final day of my year of hat-making. There is still one more hat to share, but this is really the crowning achievement.

One last look...