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Hello and thanks for visiting my blog. I have been knitting on and off for 50 years and I recently learned to crochet. I love looking for wool bargains and making them into something useful. I mainly knit for charity. I occasionally knit for myself and family members if I find a really good pattern or if they ask nicely!!

Thursday 19 January 2017

Two hats...a blog button...and lots of links



Here are two very simple hats to fit an adult. They will go into my charity box until I have enough to post off to Knit-for-Nowt.  I used a pattern called "Ellie's Easiest Ever Hat" which I think I found on the Loving Hands website.  It really is easy.  It is written for 2 needles, but I always knit this on a circular needle to avoid a bulky seam.

The pattern calls for chunky yarn or dk doubled.  I used Robin Paintbox dk in shades of blue and purple.  There is just one set of instructions.  You simply alter the size of knitting needle to adjust the hat to fit a teenager, woman, or man. I used a 5.5mm needle and dk yarn doubled to knit the woman's size.  The finished hat weighs 80g. So a standard 100g ball of dk yarn could easily be divided and then knitted together to make a cosy hat.  I think that is a great way to use up those 100g balls of yarn that are not big enough for anything else.

Moving on to a completely different subject, huge thanks go to Amy at Love Made My Home for suggesting sites that would be useful for making a blog button.  Eventually, I used a combination of Bannersnack to make the poster, Canva to turn it into a button and Inlinkz to generate the code.  Another useful site for generating code is Mycoolrealm.  I plumped for the Inlinkz code because it added my blog name under the button.  But I really liked the Mycoolrealm site as well because it lets you change the colour of the rather unattractive code box. I would have chosen this code if my blog name had been more obvious on the button. 

The days here are dreary at the moment and perfect for sitting indoors geeking.  It has been time well spent because I have been able to refresh my html skills which used to be quite good. I had to tweak the code which originally gave me a HUGE code box and I altered some of the wording.  There are still areas that could be improved; but there is a limit to how much time I can spare!  I could probably change the colour of the code box if I'm ever snowed-in for a fortnight.

So my sidebar is now hosting a blog button!  The jury is still out on this.  Some people love them and some hate them.   I have always had some belonging to other blogs on my sidebar, so I must be in the first category.  It is interesting to see that my blog stats show a huge spike in visitors since I even mentioned making a blog button. I'll watch the stats.  If they fall dramatically, that will be time for a rethink.


12 comments:

  1. The hats turned out great! hope that you have a good weekend
    Lisa

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  2. Your button looks great, glad you got it to work for you! Sorry I didn't reply about the size of the box, you can just fiddle with the code, but you have figured it out without my help, which is really great!! Things have been rather busy here this week so I am sorry I didn't reply. I do love your badge, and if I had any other badges in my sidebar I would definitely grab one!

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  3. Oh, and I forgot to say, thank you for the mention, so very kind of you!

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  4. Your blog badge is now in my sidebar! Well done for figuring out how to get the right sizes. The hats look lovely and warm, and I'm sure Knit for Nowt will be delighted with them.

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    1. Thanks! I've just popped over to have a look. I'm relieved to see the ugly code box doesn't show. I might remove that part after a few months.

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  5. Very nice work on the hats! And also on the blog button. :-)

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  6. The hat looks beautiful with blue color all over. By seeing that i will chill and warm:)

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  7. Lovely knitting for the charity.

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  8. Lovely blue hats! They look nice and warm too.

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  9. I love the hats such a pretty colour, well done on making a blog button it took me years to figure how to do my stash party button, now I've forgotten how I did it ha ha, I would love to be able to use html but I can't make head nor tail of it. :) x

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  10. can you share your pattern for knitting this in the round?

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    1. Hello Linda, This pattern isn't actually written in-the-round. I just used a circular needle and kept going. I haven't written it down, I'm afraid. The Ravelry website is highly recommended for free patterns and you can sort them by "In-the-round" and other criteria.

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