Miles' Noro Hat

I made this hat as an anniversary gift for Miles last month. I hadn't been able to photograph it until this weekend due to the aforementioned camera problem. These pictures were taken on the camera phone so they're not great but they'll do! The hat is made from a lovely, lovely Noro yarn which I bought from Angela at a yarn swap/sale hosted by Adrienne. It's called Cash Laine and is 60% wool, 20% cashmere and 20% lamb's wool (sadly, having done a quick online search, it looks like it might not be made any more). The grey colourway (#22) is rather un-Noro but works great for a man knit. The pattern is adapted from the Marsan Watchcap by Staceyjoy Elkin, and was worked on 5mm needles over 104 stitches.


Miles is really pleased with the hat (an improvement on the last one I made him two years ago which was an excessively tight skull-cap type beanie with mixed weight yarns and poor gauge - I feel my knitting has improved since then!). The reason I chose this pattern for him is he likes a cuff which he can adjust, depending on the cold, and this has an extra deep turn up. One feature of this pattern I really liked was that the twisted rib is maintained throughout: thanks to a bit of jiggery-pokery on the circulars, the whole hat is turned inside-out after the cuff so that when turned up the cuff and hat body match. I also think the decreases look really smart, and because the twisted rib has lots of stitch definition, you can see them in action!

Angela told me today that she got some more of the Cash Laine to do another jumper so I hope if she has any left-overs she passes them my way! Finally, a camera update - having researched duty free and found it to be stupidly expensive, I gave in and bought a new Samsung from Comet (one of the few times living right next to a retail park pays off!) so at least normal photo quality can be restored with the next post.

Oh, and one last thing - does anyone have any good yarn shop recommendations for Montreal or Ottawa as I'm off to Canada on Thursday?