Simple Crochet Hats ready for fun !

 Kia Ora !

Welcome to my first Blog post ! EEEK pretty exciting ! I've been debating for a while what my first blog would be about, obviously crochet & crafts but the array of choices within that is totally overwhelming! I want to use this blog to be able to teach & inspire so I thought back to when I first started crocheting. I love to make amigurumi, like seriously the feeling you get when you see the cutest creatures all finished is awesome ! Even more so is the smile on the face on the child or person its meant for ! As amigurumi is mostly worked in the round I figured the best place to start is a basic hat tutorial !

So lets get started ! As with most of my projects you can use any size yarn with corresponding hook ! The bigger the yarn, the thicker the hat & the quicker it will crochet up!

You want to start with either a magic ring or another method I tend to use is to Chain 3 then slip stitch into the first chain & insert your hook into the middle of the chains to start your first row. I usually do my hats in Double Crochet Stitches, however you can choose any basic stitch you like. If you choose Single Crochet (sc) you want to start with 8 stitches in your first row, Half double crochet (hdc) will be 10 stitches & Double Crochet (dc) will be 12 stitches. Single crochet hats will give a more fuller stitch effect but take longer, Double Crochet will be more spacy but quicker to work up. Hats are joined after each round which is different to most amigurumi so to start each round we would need to chain to get the right height (CH1 for SC, CH2 for HDC & CH3 for DC) & at the end of the row we need to ensure we slip stitch into the top of the first stitch, I don't count the chains as stitches in hats as i want to make sure there aren't any big spaces between the rows. You could also switch up the stitches, for example, single crochet until you reach your circumference you need then change to DC, just remember to change your Chain amount too! Once you get really confident you could also try some fancy stitches too.

We will then increase each row by the number of stitches we started with until we get the correct diameter according to the size we want. So if we start with 6 stitches, we will increase the second round in each stitch to make 12 stitches, see below for a example of a 5 row circumference, if you need to do more rows you just keep increasing the stitch count by the same amount in each row.

For Example:

Row 1: in magic ring CH3, DC12, SL.ST to top of 1st DC (12)

Row 2: CH3, 2DC in next 12 Stitches, SL.ST to top of 1st DC (24)

Row 3: CH3, (2DC, DC1) Rep x 12, ST.ST to top of 1st DC (36)

Row 4: CH3, (2DC, DC2) Rep x 12, SL.ST to top of 1st DC (48)

Row 5: CH3, (2DC, DC3) Rep x 12, SL.ST to top of 1st DC (60)

We will then add the appropriate length by adding rows with the same number of stitches.

Row 6: CH3, DC around, SL.ST to top of 1st DC

Once you finished adding length your hat is all done! If you like you can also add a border in SC around the bottom in an alternating colour or a pom-pom on the top. I will cover flaps & other decorative embellishments in my upcoming blogs, as well as a few extra animal feature add ons!

To find your diameter size & length, I put together a handy chart for you to use!

I hope you enjoyed my first blog & tutorial! If you have any questions please reach out, I'd also love to see your finished items!

Ka Kite

Abbi ♥🧶