A Scrappy Slip Stitch Hat Pattern

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 17:15:22 -0400

I can’t remember the last time I followed a pattern exactly. Often patterns are just suggestions or guides for me, not must-follow instructions; a gauge swatch is a test of fabric drape and density used to calculate the real numbers I’ll need against a pattern’s own gauge; sweater lengths and pattern repeats and charts are ideas to be taken, adapted, and occasionally discarded.

And yet I have never come up with my own pattern, 100% completely from scratch in over 20 years of knitting and crocheting.

That is, until now.

The Scrappy Slip Stitch Hat was born out of my desire to use the last of my Berroco Vintage Chunky to make some hats with a simple pattern that only required the use of one color at a time. It requires only a small amount of yarn and a consistent main color; although, really, you don’t even need that – it is, after all, scrappy; switch yarn colors every two rows if that’s what you see fit. It also incorporates the pattern into the crown shaping, which was easy now that I think of it, but I still feel oddly proud of.

So if you, too, have some bulky scrap yarn and a desire for a hat, here are my instructions: Follow them as much or as little as you need.

My hats came to about 9" width when laid flat, unstretched. They comfortably fit my 21.5" head and I’ve got about 3-4" of give left in there. I’d estimate they could comfortably fit heads 20-25 inches in size.

Gauge

18 stitches per 4 inches x 24 rows per 4 inches (it’s the slip stitches!)

Supplies

Bulky Yarn

I used 73 grams/100 yards purple and 62 grams/44 yards black for my purple and black hat with the folded brim.

I used 50 grams/68 yards mushroom (that undyed cream color), and 19 grams/24 yards of each of the oranges for the mushroom and orange hat with the regular brim.

Knitting Needles

10 US / 6.0 mm 16" circulars or DPNs for the brim
10.5 US / 6.5 mm 16" circulars or DPNs for the head; if using circulars you will need to switch to DPNs, use magic loop with a longer cable, or add a second set of 10.5 circulars for the crown

The Pattern

Ribbing

Size 10 needles

Cast on 86 stitches with the main color (MC)
Knit ribbing (k1, p1) for desired length, keeping track of how many rows you have knit if you want a folded brim. If not knitting a folded brim, stop at your desired length. (I knit 10 rows for my purple hat; 7 for the mushroom.)
Folded brim only: Purl 1 row
Folded brim only: Knit ribbing (k1, p1) again for the same amount of rows as prior to the purl row (i.e., I knit 10 rows for my purple hat with the folded brim)
Folded brim only: Knit one more row of ribbing, when at a knit stitch, pick up the cast on edge of the stitch at the bottom of the row (it will look like a purl from the back); knit the two stitches together.

Head

Switch to size 10.5 needles (if you want, I forgot for the mushroom hat)

Starting with the contrast color, repeat the following until you want to begin crown decreases:

Row 1 (CC): (Slip1 k1) to end

Row 2 (CC): Knit

Row 3 (MC): (k1 slip 1)to end

Row 4: (MC): Knit

End after a row 1 repeat.

Crown

Row 1 (CC): K7 k3tog (k11 k3tog) 5 times k6 (74 stitches)

Row 2 (MC): Knit in pattern

Row 3 (MC): K6 k3tog (k9 k3tog) 5 times k5 (62)

Row 4 (CC): Knit in pattern

Row 5 (CC): K5 k3tog (k7 k3tog) 5 times k4 (50)

Row 6 (MC): Knit in pattern

Row 7(MC): K4 k3tog (k5 k3tog) 5 times k3 (38)

Row 8 (CC): Knit in pattern

Row 9 (CC): (k3 k3tog) 6 times k2 (26)

Row 10 (MC): Knit in pattern

Row 11 (MC): K2 k3tog (k1 k3tog) 5 times k1 (14)

Row 12 (CC): Knit in pattern

Row 13 (CC): (k2togbl k2tog) to end (7)

Cut both threads and pull through loops; weave in ends.

And that’s it! Eventually I plan on grading this to have a larger and smaller version, upon which I’ll maybe run a small test (just to test running a pattern test), and release it as a PDF pattern on Ravelry. But until then: Enjoy! And be sure to ping me on Ravelry if you use the pattern!

Projects in this post:

My Yarn Can't Reach the Moon, But It Can Make It Up Everest 23 Times

Wed, 23 Sep 2026 17:30:13 -0400

I have been knitting for over 20 years.

I learned from the Internet, slightly after YouTube was created but before it really took off, from the low-res videos on a particularly periwinkle knitting help website. I also read blogs: so many blogs. The Internet was awash in knitting blogs back then, and they were some of the most widely-read blogs out there. Seriously. It was A Whole Thing.

One of the habits I picked up from these blogs was Always Buy An Extra Skein of Yarn. This prevented the woe one would experience when they came up short for a project and couldn’t get to the store; or worse yet, could, but found the store was sold out or only had yarn from a visibly different dye lot. (This was, as you could imagine, before most yarn stores were selling online.) And when you are just starting out, with 6 balls of yarn to your name, this is an amazing idea.

Eventually, however, this became An Issue.

This became an issue because often I would not use those extra skeins, leaving me with too little yarn to really make anything other than hats, which I did not really wear (and it would be several years before I met my husband, who does wear knit hats). This became an issue, because like most new knitters, I found the projects I were drawn to were not the projects I wore. This became an issue, because I am a dedicated frogger of those unworn projects, meaning while I also bought yarn for new projects, plenty of my old projects stopped being projects and became balls of yarn again. Oops. I also inherited my mother-in-law’s yarn stash, which certainly embiggened my own.

That said, it’s also easy enough to not realize how much yarn you have. This might seem preposterous given that I have literally hundreds of balls of yarn, but until I moved into my current house, most of my yarn lived in boxes and bags that were around and I did not know what I had, so I would find a new project and look through some of the stash, but forget the other bits of it existed, and then just buy new yarn if I didn’t have enough of what I wanted or the yarn I could see just wasn’t right. Also, balls of yarn are small, especially if you compress them into plastic ziplock bags to keep the moths out.

But then I moved. I put all my yarn into one place. I also I stashed it on Ravelry. And that was when I realized I might have a not-so-small problem.

And so, last January, I stopped buying yarn. The more whimsical of you might say I began my stashbusting journey, but mostly I would argue that I finally just new what I had and it became easier to use it.

Since then, I have used almost 100 individual skeins of yarn. Most of it was bulky-weight or thicker, meaning I cleared out over three bags in what felt like record time. I also got to use yarn I had mostly fallen out of love with because I bought it when I was eighteen and tried projects I would have never made before. Seriously, who knew fluffy amigurumi yarn critters would be so cute? Mushroom Guys? Fuzzy cat hats? Giant cotton cardigans I wear constantly even though it’s pink and striped? Sign me up. Not forever – I’ve crawled back to fingering- and lace-weight shawls lately for the technical challenge after months of bulky fluff. But after 20 years, it’s been interesting to discover there is still plenty of things to try – or try again after a decade or so.

That said, if I maintain my current trajectory, I still have about 9 years before I run out of yarn. Wish me luck?

Patterns and projects shown/referenced in this post:

Stashbusting | blog.kittenin.space