Cat Mad Crochet

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

I come to you today with the happy news that I completed not only the capelet for Hannah (and before the New Year, too) but also a hat for my mother! Two projects! Two! I am a woman working at her peak! Behold my magnificence!

Well, the house is a wreck, and I haven’t been writing on other projects like I should be, but these projects are done, so I’m counting this as direct evidence of my success. The other projects be damned! Who needs a clean house anyway? Where’s the character in that?

On to the projects themselves!

Hannah’s capelet has a yoke worked in moss stitch, a little line of single crochet post stitches to mark the end of that section because I thought it looked snazzy, and then a large, open, shell edge.

I worked a circular yoke with a two row increase throughout the moss stitch section. This worked well because there was enough increase in the solid section that it carried through to the lace section without me having to do additional math and crochet magic to work increases in the shell pattern. I’m pretty sure I know what would work if I had to, but I didn’t have to and that is a joy.

I ended the capelet off so it hits just below Hannah’s elbow. I then worked a button placket up and down each side and around the top. (I worked decreases across the top to make it lie flat.) I took a final round of single crochet around the entire capelet for that much coveted finished edge. I added a pretty button and found myself down a project! Happy day!

If I did this one over, I don’t think I would change anything. I’m super happy with it.

My mother’s hat was a last minute surprise project. I used some mushroom-colored stash yarn in a fingering weight. For the band, I used a textured lace stitch to allow for a snug but flexible fit. I worked this with a 2.75 mm hook. I really like this stitch pattern, so I was a little sad to switch to a different one, but such are the ways of hats. I bumped the hook size up to a 4 mm hook and worked linked double crochets, back loop only, for the body of the hat. The hook size bump gave the body of the hat a looser feel, which looks cute but doesn’t leave the wearer feeling like they look like they have a little pin head.

I have a funny story for which you need to understand that my maiden name is Penn. My parents and I all have relatively small heads, as does Hannah. Adia and Dave, and Dave’s side of the family, have large heads. When I texted my parents about how I planned to construct my mother’s hat, I did voice to text because I am old and speak way faster than I can type on a phone. I said “I need to make the body bigger so you don’t look like you have a little pin head” (If, say, one were to be experiencing hair loss, a tight fitting hat would show that more than one might think.) but my phone heard “I need to make the body bigger so you don’t look like you have a little Penn head.” The judgment. I do not need it.

Anyway, the body of the hat is bigger. I am very pleased with this one, but I would make a change if I were to work it again. I ended up with three extra stitches when I went to decrease for the top of the hat. I just sort of left them at the end of the round each round until the last few rounds when I treated them as another decrease and made them go away. If I did this hat over, I would increase by nine stitches in the first linked double crochet row after the band. It wouldn’t compromise the loose feel of the hat by taking stitches away, and it would make the decrease at the end come out perfectly.

I could have frogged this hat and made that change, but I didn’t. I was rushing. I am like that.

Anyway, two projects down! I’m still making circles. I am back to working on Hannah’s blue rectangle wrap and a striped mini-shawl for Adia.

The chins continue to eat my dining room. I recently reheard They Might Be Giant’s The House at the Top of the Tree, and it really makes me think of the chins. There is a plan to eat the house, my house, and the call is coming from inside the house already. There’s giggling at the other end of the line. I am not safe.

Meg has had some painful days, but we’re working through them. Feline arthritis is no joke.

One of my favorite air plants is no longer with me. It looked like a tiny burr and brought me great joy. Unfortunately, I was not up to the task of giving it the appropriate life sustaining care that it needed. On an up note, there are many others and some of them are happily pupping away. The ways of air plants are tenuous and fraught when being raised in the snowy north.

Until next time, stay healthy and give them hell.