Jack – The Pumpkin Sock Monkey

Around this time of year, we are inundated with pumpkins- from pumpkin spice lattes to pumpkin chili.  I actually enjoy pumpkin pie, pumpkin muffins and pumpkin spice lattes, but I do have my limits.  I cannot fathom trying pumpkin chili or pumpkin soup.  Anyways I thought we could use a pumpkin inspired sock monkey.  Of course, you can use this pattern for any type of sock monkey, just change the colors and use your imagination!

 

Sock Monkey
<Free Pattern>

I made this hat on a 31 peg loom for a young child

To create a this brim
–Using 2 strands of  green yarn
Row 1: e-wrap the pegs  (for this type of brim-garter stitch- I don’t use the peg on the side. I typically begin with the 1st peg and have my slip know part of the brim)
Row 2: purl stitch
Row 3:  e-wrap stitch
Row 4: purl stitch
Row 5:  e-wrap stitch
Row 6: purl stitch

For the face
–Using a white yarn and an orange yarn
e-wrap  until the hat is 4.5  inches long (from bottom of brim to top)
My row count is 15  (not including the brim)

For the top of the hat
–Using 2 strands of orange yarn
e-wrap for 3 rows

–Change to 2 strands of white yarn
e-wrap for 3 rows and close the hat  using the gathered method
(our friend, Denis at Loomahat.com a great tutorial on how to close that hat here)

For the Ears    (Crochet)
–Using a white yarn and an orange yarnWe followed a YouTube Tutorial

For the Mouth    (Crochet)
–Using a brown yarn
Crochet a chain of 12 for 2 rows
–Switch to a white yarn
Crochet 1 sc in each chain, except at the ends
For the ends, DC in each chain to create an oval

Sew the mouth, ears, button eyes and pom-pom onto the hat

I have made a few different variations of the sock monkey as they were specially requested.

 

If you use this pattern, we would love to see your creations!  Post a picture in the comments 🙂
~Pali

Football Fanatics

After looking in my yarn stash and having the desire to whip out something special, my daughter made a football hat for a young chemo warrior.  She commented that we have made football hats before, but most of them were little for babies in the NICU.  Being a huge football fan herself, she wanted to make a football hat for another kid who loves football.

Football hat
<Free Pattern>

Made this hat on a 36 peg loom for a child

To create a this brim
Using a brown yarn
Row 1: e-wrap the pegs  (for this type of brim-garter stitch- I don’t use the peg on the side. I typically begin with the 1st peg and have my slip know part of the brim)
Row 2: purl stitch
Row 3:  e-wrap stitch
Row 4: purl stitch
Row 5:  e-wrap stitch
Row 6: purl stitch
Row 7:  e-wrap stitch
Row 8: purl stitch

For the rest of the hat
—Using a brown yarn
e-wrap  12 rows (from bottom of brim to end of 12 row is 5 inches)
Change yarn to White yarn
—Using a white yarn
e-wrap  4 rows
Change yarn to Brown yarn
—Using a Brown yarn
e-wrap 3 rows

To close the hat
I use Jeannie Phillips method of closing the hat, as it creates a rounded, less bunchy top.   You knit 2 pegs, then purl 2 pegs for 3 rows.
Go around the loom twice and then cut off the yarn
With a threaded tapestry needle, you remove all the purl stitched pegs and pull as tight as you progress
You can find Jeannie’s video tutorial link on our Tutorials Page under “Binding Off (or Finishing the Hat)”  – Flat Drawstring Cast Off
Go around and remove all the knit stitches from the loom and close by making a cross (sew the yarn in a + at the top of the stitches) and then go in through the top of the hat.
Make a knot inside the hat and cut off the excess yarn.

Finger Laces
Sew the finger laces on the front of the hat with a white yarn, using a tapestry needle.

You may have a tail near the brim.  You can make sure to secure it with a knot, very close to the brim and cut off the excess yarn.

I hope that you enjoy this pattern and can begin to make football hats for all the football fans in your life!
~Pali

Endless Gratitude to LoomaHat

“All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today.” ~Proverb

Earlier this year, we connected with a dear lady, Denise from LoomaHat (link), and she has been so supportive of Knitting Rays of Hope and our mission.  We are so grateful for her and our friendship, that it is difficult to express as eloquently as I wish I could.  She has recently designed a hat just for us and donated these 3 lovely hats using her pattern. These hats will be loved by their recipients!  For the free pattern, please visit LoomaHat’s post on Basketweave Stitch Hat  (link).

She has been such a great supporter of helping to spread awareness for Knitting Rays of Hope.  We have been featured numerous times on her blog and just would like to take an opportunity to show her some love back.

The Loomahat blog (link) has great tutorials and information for Loom Knitting.  Please stop by.  We are sure once you check the blog out, it will become one of your favorite bookmarks!

Please follow Loomahat on your preferred social media site (or all) :):

Blog: http://www.loomahat.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LoomaHat
PInterest: http://www.pinterest.com/loomahat
Twitter: https://twitter.com/LoomaHat

Denise has also recently created a blog that contains Spanish loom knitting tutorials.  The blog is: http://www.comotelar.com 

Please let her know that your friends at Knitting Rays of Hope sent you.

Thank you!  Thank you!  Thank you!  Though “thank you” doesn’t seem enough, I hope you know how treasured your friendship is to us!
~Pali & Vanessa

Lil Frankies- Free Pattern

Just in time for Halloween, we thought we would share with you a super easy pattern– Frankenstein hats for NICU babies.  Of course, you can make these hats for bigger goblins by using a bigger loom and knitting more rows.

Using a newborn loom (24 peg)

Brim
Row 1- Purl
Row 2 E-wrap
Row 3 Purl
Row 4 E-wrap
Row 5 Purl
Row 6 E-wrap

For the rest of the hat- E-wrap
I don’t like providing row counts, as it changes depending on how thick the yarn is.
So for Preemies, I make the hats 4 inches (measuring from bottom of the hat to top).  Usually comes to be 20 rows

For Newborns- 5 inches
For Toddlers- 5 1/2 inches
For Children- 6 to 6/12 inches
For Teenagers & Women- 7 to 7 1/2 inches
For Men- 8 to 8 1/2 inches

To close the top of the hat
Thread the tapestry needle with a different color yarn and remove the hat off the loom, peg by peg.
Then with the same color yarn as the hat, you single-crochet 2 loops together
Continue SC 2 loops together until the hat is completely closed
Remove the different color yarn and discard (or keep it in your scrap pile)

For hair
Flat Top
2 HDC (Half Double Crochet) in each stitch with black yarn
or
Spikey Top
Cut approximately 2 inch pieces of yarn (about 16 or so)
Using crochet hook, crochet 1 piece of yarn into each stitch
You may want to do 2 pieces of yarn in each stitch- depending on how full you want it to look
Once done, trim the tops so they are even to desired length

For Neck Bolts
Using Gray Yarn
I made i-cords using the Spool Loom
I tripled wrapped each peg and e-wrapped for 3 rows
Normal Bind off and close
Sew onto each side of the hat

If you give these a try, we would love to see pictures.
~Pali

Minion- Free Hat Pattern

We are extremely pleased to announce a free pattern for creating a Minion hat, due to popular demand.  Almost daily, people have been searching our blog on how to create a Minion, so we thought that we would create a pattern for all those Minion fans out there. The Minion is my favorite hat to create and it is really easy.   Now on to the directions:

Minion hat
<Free Pattern>

I made this hat on a 39 peg loom

Step 1: Looming the Hat

For the  brim
Rows 1- 4 garter stitch (purl 1 row, knit 1 row).
You can adjust the brim size by garter stitching less or more rows.

For the hat
E-Wrap using the yellow color to about 3 1/2 inches up from the brim
Switched yarn to black
To switch colors, you simply cut the yellow and tie on the black and continue e-wrapping.
E-Wrap about 5 rows of the black
Switch back to the yellow color for about 2 inches.
The height at which you change colors will depend on the size of hat that you are creating.

Step 2: Crochet the Eye
Need black yarn, white yarn and dark steel gray yarn; an appropriate sized crochet hook
SC-Single Crochet
HDC- Half Double Crochet

Using Black Yarn
Chain 5 single crochet
Slip stitch together
SC into circle 10 sc (make sure the tail is in the single crochets)
Pull the tail tight to close the circle

Change to White Yarn
Slip stitch to join to black yarn
Chain up 1 (Sc)
Row 1-2 HDC in each black stitch
Chain up 2 (SC)
Row 2- 2 HDC in each white stitch

Change to Gray Yarn
Slip stitch to join to white yarn
Chain up 1 (Sc)
SC in each white stitch to make frame

Step 3: Creating the Mouth
Using Black Yarn
SC a chain of 8
Turn the chain over
1 Sc into each stitch
Sew the mouth on in a smile shape (note: I find it easier to sew on the tongue then the mouth).

Step 4: Creating the Tongue
Using red yarn
Chain 5
1 Sc in first chain
1 Dc into the next 3 chains
1 Sc in the last chain
Turn over and repeat pattern 1 Sc in first and last stitch and 1 Dc in each of the other stitches.
Then sew this on to the hat and the mouth on top of it.

Step 5- Creating the Hair
Cut a 6 inch long strand of black yarn.  Fold over the yarn (doubling it) feed it through the needle keeping it doubled. Pull the needle through the head and pull the tail of the yarn through the loop that is created. Continue this with as many strands as you like. For the Minion pictures above I did this step 5 times.

I hope that you enjoy this pattern and can begin to create wonderful Minions that will bring smiles to children. Would love to see pictures of the Minions that you create.
~Vanessa

Free Patterns Page is Live

We have been frequently asked for patterns for our hats.  Though we really don’t have or follow patterns, we have just been winging it, we discussed it thoroughly and agreed that it would be a good idea to try to start a list of patterns.  We currently have 3 patterns available for you.  We are quite new to documenting a pattern, so if anything is amiss, please let us know.  We will be glad to help and in turn, it will improve our pattern writing skills.

The page is here.

Hope you find this helpful.
~Pali & Vanessa

Purple Envelope Hat- A Quick How-To

It seems that making an envelope style hat (as pictured above) might be a little confusing, so I would like to provide everyone with a quick how-to guide with pictures.  I love the way these look when worn as I think it provides just a touch of unique flair.  The hat is not difficult to make- really the only thing that is different than a normal loom knitted hat is how to close it.

For the brim, I did my usual garter stitch (1 row purl, 1 row knit) for 6 rows.  I then proceeded to e-wrap the hat until my desired length.  This will be a hat for a child, around kindergarten aged, so I made the hat 5 1/2 inches long.

Thread a tapestry needle with a different color yarn so you can see the last row loops clearly.  You can take the hat off the loom and it will be open with the yellow (or different color) yarn in each loop.

Once the hat is off the loom, with the yellow thread in each loop, you should match up 2 loops together.

With an appropriate sized crochet hook, you will then single crochet the coupled loops together.  Once the entire top of the hat is closed with a single crochet (each loop is coupled and closed together with a single crochet), you can pull out the yellow (or differing colored) yarn out of the hat and discard.    You have now completed an envelope styled hat.  You can adorn the top with pom-poms or tassles.  You can embellish the hat with a face or flowers to your heart’s desire.

I hope that you will find these directions and pictures easy to follow.  Please comment if there is anything you find unclear.
May you have a fantastic day!
~Pali

3 Mike Waszowski’s

As promised in this post (More Love from South Dakota), we embellished some of the hats Cindy & Brittni created with the yarn they sent.  Here are 3 Mike Waszowski’s from the Monsters, Inc movie.  Later this month, Monsters will be having a prequel released, and I am sure Mike is going to be a popular character this summer.  I have another idea for embellishing some of  Cindy & Brittni’s hats and will try to put that into work soon.  For a free pattern on how to loom knit the Mike Hat and then crochet the embellishments, please go to this post (link).
~Pali

PS- This is our 200th post!  WooHoo!

Mike and Sully

With the Monsters Inc. prequel movie about to be released and because of the inventory I have of this green yarn that just screams Mike Wazoski, we had to make more monster hats.  Using most of my green Mike yarn from my yarn stash, I made 2 more Mike hats.  Since we made about 5 Mike Wazoski hats recently, I ran to the store to pick up a blue yarn for Sully.  Sully’s horns were very tricky and after several attempts, Vanessa did a remarkable job, wouldn’t you agree?

Though I don’t follow a pattern (I generally just eyeball my work), I am trying to document a how-to for those that are interested.

Mike Wazoski hat
<Free Pattern>

I made this hat on a 36 peg loom for a child

To create a this brim
Row 1: e-wrap the pegs  (for this type of brim-garter stitch- I don’t use the peg on the side. I typically begin with the 1st peg and have my slip know part of the brim)
Row 2: purl stitch
Row 3:  e-wrap stitch
Row 4: purl stitch
Row 5:  e-wrap stitch
Row 6: purl stitch

For the rest of the hat
e-wrap  until the hat is 6  inches long (from bottom of brim to top)
My row count is 24 (not including the brim)

To close the hat
I use Jeannie Phillips method of closing for Mike as it creates a rounded, less bunchy top.   You knit 2 pegs, then purl 2 pegs for 3 rows.
Go around the loom twice and then cut off the yarn
With a threaded tapestry needle, you remove all the purl stitched pegs and pull as tight as you progress
You can find Jeannie’s video tutorial link on our Tutorials Page under “Binding Off (or Finishing the Hat)”  – Flat Drawstring Cast Off
Go around and remove all the knit stitches from the loom and close by making a cross (sew the yarn in a + at the top of the stitches) and then go in through the top of the hat.
Make a knot inside the hat and cut off the excess yarn.

You may have a tail near the brim.  You can make sure to secure it with a knot, very close to the brim and cut off the excess yarn.

Loom Knit the 2 Antennae on a Loom Spooler
Row 1: e-wrap the peg
Row 2 & 3: Purl stitch
Row 4-8: E-wrap stitch
Row 9: Bind off or take off the loom spooler
You can then bring the thread into the antennae to the bottom
Make a second antennae

Crochet the Eye
Need: Black yarn, blue yarn, and white yarn; an appropriate sized crochet hook
DC-  Double Crochet
HDC – Half Double Crochet

Using Black Yarn
Chain 5 single crochets
Slip stitch together
Single Crochet into circle 8 sc (make sure the tail is in the single crochets)
Pull the tail tight, to close the circle.
Change to the blue yarn
Slip stitch to join to black
SC 8 (around the circle)
HDC around the circle
End with a slip knot to secure all stitches
Change to the white yarn
Slip stitch to join to blue
SC around the circle
DC into each stitch around the circle
SC around the circle

To Finish the Hat
Sew all embellishments (2 antennae and 1 eyeball) onto the hat using a tapestry needle

I do not claim to be an expert pattern writer, if you have any questions, please comment below.  I hope to help if you are confused.

We will include these in May’s shipment of hats to a local pediatric cancer organization.  I hope that these will bring hope and happiness to these brave children fighting cancer.
~Pali

We joined a link up party here.

Brain Cancer Awareness

May is Brain Cancer Awareness Month.   According the American Brain Tumor Association (link), brain tumors are the 2nd leading cause of cancer-related deaths in children  (under the age of 20), second to Leukemia.  There are many campaigns out there to increase awareness, educate the people, but the one message that stuck with me is:  “I could be your child.”  I just couldn’t imagine the anguish that these families experience.  The National Brain Tumor Society (link) has a great website for education, awareness, how to become an advocate for Brain Cancer.

As discussed here, we are hoping to bring increased awareness, so in honor of May being Brain Cancer Awareness Month, I created this hat.

I wrote up a pattern, as suggested when we participated in the Link Up Party.  This is my first time writing a pattern, so if you have any feedback that could help me, I would greatly appreciate hearing it.

<Free Pattern>
I made this hat on a 36 peg loom for a woman.

To create a this brim
Row 1: e-wrap the pegs
Row 2: purl stitch
Row 3:  e-wrap stitch
Row 4: purl stitch
Row 5:  e-wrap stitch
Row 6: purl stitch

For the rest of the hat
e-wrap  until the hat is 7 inches long (from bottom of brim to top)
My row count is 28 (not including the brim)

To close the hat
On last row of e-wrap, cut 12 inches of the yarn.  Thread this yarn thru a tapestry needle, and take each stitch off the peg.  When all stitches are removed from the pegs, pull the hat closed.  Make a cross (sew the yarn in a + at the top of the stitches) and then go in through the top of the hat.  Make a knot inside the hat and cut off the excess yarn.

You may have a tail near the brim.  You can make sure to secure it with a knot, very close to the brim and cut off the excess yarn.

Crochet the Special Awareness Ribbon
Using Charisma yarn and a crochet hook size K
HDC- Half Double Crochet
Chain 33 single crochets
Skip last 2 in the chain, and HDC in each stitch until you get to the beginning slip knot.
End with a slip knot to secure all stitches

Shape into a ribbon and sew onto the hat using a tapestry needle

I plan to deliver this hat with a few others that we have at the Kaiser Oncology Department in Ontario, where my sister-in-law used to receive her treatment.  We will see how that goes… I think it’s time and I know they are needed, though I am not sure if I am strong enough to make this drop off without tears.  I really miss her…
~Pali