A Hat Too?

I joined my second ball of yarn the to my scarf during the presidential debate the other night. (Clearly I was relieving some frustrations with my needles because I was rocking that scarf for those two hours.) When the debate was over, I noticed that I had quite a scarf pile in my lap. My plan so far has been to knit the scarf until I ran out of yarn, but I thought it might be fun to measure it since it seemed to be growing so well. It was well over 40". My general scarf goal is 60". They aren't always that size, but it is usually what I am shooting for. It started to occur to me that I had no idea what i was going to do with a 90" scarf. Something that much taller than me seems destined to be dragged in the mud unknowingly. Then I realized that this scarf had a soul mate. I had to knit it a hat.

I didn't have to do much searching for the perfect project at all. The Amanda Hat was already in my queue. It calls for a half of a skein of Malabrigo and the ones I found that used Manos said they used less than a full skein. The stitch isn't the same, but feel that it is close enough that even a knitter with a critical eye and a tendency toward perfection would bless this union. (Especially since most of the pattern for the scarf is worked in the purl stitches, and I'm knitting the hat in the round and not purling at all during that pattern.) If you would like a good look at the two different stitches you can click on the picture and check it out much bigger.

I promptly cut the ball I had just joined off my scarf, and cast on for my hat. (Note: I don't recommend going swatchless for those playing along at home, but I am a little tight on yarn for this project so I risked it.) The new plan is to finish the hat and then use whatever is left over for the scarf. The scarf is big enough right now for a good wrap around the neck. If there isn't much left at all, it will still be a fantastic scarf. The slight shortage will be made up for by its personal happiness from having a soul mate and never being lonely again.