dancing hats

Margaret W was pretty shocked when she saw her hats start dancing. So were we.

be afraid

This week's scary little hat was knitted by Sainsbury's veteran Margaret S. This hat is simply the best because:

1. Mr vampire has his own proper posh red felt-lined cloak

2. He has blood dripping from his fangs

3. It's Halloween on Wednesday so choosing this hat makes us feel very up with the trends

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

his and hers

My profound affection for these little hats led me to ask my housemates to knit a few.  However, when I asked Tim & JoJo to “knit a couple of hats” I fear they may have taken it too literally. The result, you must agree, is most original. Thanks to everyone who sent in hats, I’ve really enjoyed seeing your fantastic creations. Keep your eyes firmly focused on the shelves at Sainsbury’s, the little hats will be popping up within weeks.

A post by Mike

a card made by tim

Tim made this card for his mum Heather who's been busy knitting us lots of hats for the Big Knit this year. We thought it was pretty special and wanted to share it with you. Thank you Tim.

400 hats and counting

I have a knitting blog and through it I have made lots of friends around the world. I thought I'd put an appeal out to all of these friends to knit me a few hats to raise some well deserved money. As I know knitters though, I figured that the offer of a yarn would probably help motivate many of them to dig through their stashes (many of them rather large) and cast on for a few hats so I am organising a raffle with yarn and knitting related prizes for the lucky winners.

Little did I know that I would end up with over 400 hats. I know that Mike has said that he wanted to see what 400,000 little hats would look like so I thought I'd give him a taster and show him what 400 look like.

I reckon that with 400,000 hats, I'd want to jump in to the pile just to see what it's like...

a nice cup of tea

Thank you to Debs for sending patterns for these fine hats. They make me feel nice and cosy on this cold autumn morning. We hope that you enjoy them, and if you have any creative ideas that you would like to share, then please get in touch. Think of it like a swapsies of inspiration.

"Hellooo

Here are the patterns for the tea pot and the cake…

Starting with a nice cake

To make a ball shaped hat - cast on 28 stitches and rib two rows.

Next row: increase to 42 stitches evenly across row purl 42 stitches. Next row: increase to 56 stitches evenly across row stocking stitch 7 rows decrease to 42 stitches evenly across row purl 42 decrease to 28 stitches evenly across row purl 28 stitches decrease to 14 stitches decrease to 7 stitches on the purl row thread the wool through and pull up tightly.

To make the icing pattern in the ball shape, alternate brown and white evenly across the 7 rows of 56 stitches.

Then top off with a red cherry bobble!

And for the tea pot

Cast on 28 stitches and rib two rows in blue.

Alternate blue and white wool every two rows for 3 rows Knit one row in blue then during the next purl row decrease once somewhere in the knitting to end up with 27 stitches.

To create the flat top of the tea pot

Knit 27 stitches in white, then knit the next row to create a purl row on the right side. In blue (K1, K2tog) to end. 18 stitches. Purl one row in blue. In white (K2tog) to end 9 stitches.

Bind off tightly and sew hat side together.

Add a blue bobble.

To make the spout and handle

Knit these by using i-cord. You knit this on two double ended (cable) needles. Cast on 4 stitches, then knit a row. Instead of passing the needle over to your left hand and turning it over, push the knitting to the end of the needle and carry on knitting with the wool passed behind the knitting. If you pull as you knit, you will create a tube of knitting. Continue until you have a spout and handle the right size. Thread the wool through the four stitches, pull tightly and fasten off, threading the wool through the i-cord. Now attach to tea pot.

Cheers

Debs"

little red riding hood

Here are this week’s rather spectacular hats of the week – knitted by Ann C in Bradford. What really stood out for me was Little Red Riding Hood’s wicker basket filled with cake and a little pot of butter (or at least I think this is what’s hiding under her white cloth).

We also think that it’s pretty clever how Ann has managed to bring such life to Little Red Riding Hood – with a clearly anxious expression as she is challenged by the big furry wolf with red goggly eyes and shining white teeth. Perfect.

final call

The clock's ticking and Mike's rolling in hats. In fact we've been really happy how many hats are coming in now that the postal system is moving again, but we still need more to reach our mighty target. If you've been putting off sending yours, please get them in the post as soon as you can. We've still got a way to go on our hatometer until we can all breathe easy.

professional help

It's been great to see so many businesses getting invloved with our Big Knit project this year along with the individual knitters.

A couple of examples I've just come across are the kind people at Zoppa who have been lending a hand and some folk from the National Museums of Liverpool who've created a very colourful little slide show here (excuse the beer, it's a Friday though).

And then there are our friends at Sainsbury's who along with exclusively selling our smoothies with hats this winter have been rolling their sleeves up and helping to knit them to.

From left to right Jo Waller, Hazel Glover, Julie Wilby, Sue Leather , Martin Jackson and Front Sue Mellows Facer.

This is Sainsbury's Guisborough who have hand knitted 1700 hats alone.

It's been really motivating to see so many people joining in, young and old, business and seasoned knitter, Andrew and Margaret (and Marie of course).

We just need to keep an eye on that hatometer now.

mrs mouse

At Fruit Towers we absolutely love this hat. It’s sitting on my desk at the moment and has attracted lots of passing interest. Mrs Mouse (as I’ve temporarily named her), was knitted by our Heather’s Mum, Mrs Callan. Mrs Callan has been busy knitting hats with the girls at St Joseph’s Convent School for the Big Knit and we can’t wait to see how they got on.

We’ve been having a little debate about whether Mrs Mouse is a fictional character and have decided that it has a fantastically Beatrix Potter-esque feel to it. After careful research on the Peter Rabbit site, I concluded that it was a pretty good match to Hunca Munca.

However I’ve since discovered that Heather’s nickname used to be ‘Mouse’ – and so maybe this is what gave inspiration for this lovely design. The mystery continues – but either way, I’m sure you’ll agree with us that this is a special hat. My favourite feature is the bonnet. And the whiskers are pretty cool too.