Most people when they learn how to knit learn
the basics, like casting-on, and knitting, and purling, and binding off. And then your
first project is usually a scarf or two. This is the scarf pattern that I offer, itís
a video tutorial called ìYour First Scarfî. Now as your knitting teacher, I want you to
move on from rectangles as soon as you can. So in this tutorial weíre going to learn
how to make this hat. Which is a really good second project after
youíve finished your first rectangle. This pattern, this pattern is available in
three sizes ñ Child, Adult Small, and Adult Large. And this is available for purchase and download
over on my website, and the scarf pattern is as well. The materials youíll need and the needles
youíll need are the same as for the scarf pattern, and everything is detailed in the
pattern for what youíll need. So first up weíre going to learn how to cast
on in the round, using circular needles, and how to work the rib pattern. And weíll go on, weíre going to work with
double pointed needles and weíre going to learn how to do some decreases for the crown
of the hat. So there are a lot of good lessons in this. Next up, weíre going to cast-on. Just like when you made your scarf, the first
thing we need to do to get going on the hat is to cast on stitches. And if you followed along with the scarf pattern,
the first scarf pattern that I offer, we used the long tail cast on, which is what I recommend
for this pattern as well. Letís take a look at what we have here. Remember, the details for the needles and
yarn that youíll need is all in the pattern. I have most of my stitches cast on here, Iíve
left myself just a few more. Okay. Now knitting in the round is going to be different
than how we knit our scarf, because weíre just going to keep going around and around
and around and never turn the work like we did when we were making the scarf. The first thing you want to do after you get
all the stitches cast on the number that you need for the size youíre knitting, you want
to make sure that nothing is twisted. And in doing that, Iím going to line up all
of the little knots from my cast on, so that theyíre all on the inside of the needle here
like this. I have the working yarn and the tail over
here on the right hand needle. Okay, and there we go. I donít think anything
is twisted anymore. Iím going to separate the tail from the working
yarn. Iím going to flop the working yarn over the
top and leave the tail on the bottom. Now we need one of these. A little ring marker,
so that we know where the beginning of our round is. And Iím going to slide that on to the right
needle and pick up the work here. Well, first I want to tell you. The working
yarnís over here, and this is going to be your first stitch. When you use this yarn
to knit this stitch, itís going to close up the loop and youíll be knitting in the
round. So we pick everything up, whoops, slide the
marker over to the right needle. We start with two knit stitches. And then we pull the yarn forward between
the two needles to work a purl stitch. We covered this in the last lesson learning
to knit a scarf, in combining knits and purls. Go back to knitting two, pull the yarn forward,
purl one, put the yarn back, and knit two. Youíre going to maintain this pattern not
only all the way around, but every row of the hat. Youíll get very used to working
the rib pattern. This is a very stretchy rib. Now youíre going to keep working all the
way around, around, around until you get back to the marker. When you hit the marker again, youíll know
that youíve finished one round. And when you hit the marker, youíll just
slide it from the left needle to the right needle and keep going. Itís really easy. Now something important to recognize. Here
I have a little bit more knit on the cap. Thereís going to be a time youíre going
to put the work down, because the phone rang or something, and youíre going to pick it
back up again and wonder where you are in the rib pattern. I want to take a look at the difference between
knit and purl stitches. Because we know we have a knit two, purl one
rib, but where are you if you if you pick up - drop your work and you pick it up again? Letís take a close look at the stitches. These two stitches are knit stitches. And
itís because they look like Vs on the needle. This one here is a purl stitch, because it
looks like it has a little scarf around itís neck. Thereís a horizontal loop right under
the stitch on the needle. So thatís a purl, those two are knits, thatís
a purl. And when I put this work down I ended with
ñ knit, knit, purl. So Iím ready to work two knit stitches. And that of course is going to happen. Youíre
not going to finish this hat in one sitting, so youíre going to have to pick it up and
figure out where you are. Next up weíre going to work the decreases
in the hat which is going to shape the crown, and switch to double pointed needles. You should be at a point in your hat where
you followed the directions to knit the number of inches that you need for the size youíre
making. And now weíre ready to start decreasing.
Which is this part of the hat. We decrease for the crown so that we have a gradual slope
up to the very top center of the hat. Now, letís take a look at the work and see
how this is done. Youíll see here that Iím at the beginning
of my round, Iím going to slide my marker. And each of the sizes is written a little
bit differently, but Iím making a child size hat here, which tells me to knit 9, or work
nine in pattern and knit two together. So, Iím going to knit, knit, purl, knit,
knit, purl ñ that was six. Knit, knit, purl. That was nine. And now I
knit two together. And the way we do that, is instead of just
going into one stitch to knit, we go through two stitches on the needle, wrap it and pull
it through making one out of two stitches. Now I work another nine in pattern. And Iím
going to start with a purl stitch here. And remember, I can tell thatís a purl stitch
because it looks like it has a little scarf around itís neck. So itís purl, knit, knit, purl. Iím going
to work these nine stitches. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
nine. And then Iím going to work knit two together
again. Now you have a purl stitch here and a knit
stitch. But youíre going to knit those two together, regardless of what stitches you
see there. Itís always knit two together. And then itís back to nine in pattern. So youíre going to follow the directions,
and eventually get back here to the beginning of your round. And then I believe, yes. After a decrease
round, you just work the round in pattern as you see it. And youíve been working knit, knit, purl,
knit, knit, purl, all the way up to this point in the hat. But things are going to change. Youíre going
to have to pay attention to what you see and what you knit. For example, I have knit, knit, purl, knit,
knit, purl, knit, knit, purl, KNIT, purl. Because I knit those two together when we
were decreasing, right? So youíll work a decrease round, and then
youíll knit in pattern, youíll work in pattern to what you see, and the third round is another
decrease round. And youíre going to keep, the top of the
hat is going to keep getting smaller and smaller until eventually it doesnít fit on these
round needles anymore. When that happens, youíre going to want to
switch to double pointed needles, which is why the pattern calls for these as well. And the way that you switch to double pointed
needles, is that, instead of using the left needle, you just pick up an empty double pointed
needle and start working with it. Like this. And youíll put a third of the stitches on
this needle, a third of the stitches on another double pointed needle, and the last third
on a third double pointed needle, and youíll have an empty one to knit with. Weíll be done with the circular needles at
that point. Iím not counting, but Iím going to go ahead
and guess that thatís a third of my stitches. I pick up an empty dpn. And just start working the stitches on to
here. You only have to do this when you find that
the stitches are really stretched around the circular needle. I like to stay on the circular needles as
long as I can, because it does go more quickly. Okay. So you will work the last of those stitches
on a third double pointed needle, and youíll use your fourth double pointed needle, the
empty one, to knit with. And youíll just knit on to the empty double
pointed needle each time you go around. It will be just like working in the round,
but you will be using these three, that will accommodate fewer and fewer and fewer stitches,
instead of the circular needle. So go ahead and follow your pattern, and in
the next video weíre going to talk about closing up the very top of the hat. You should have very, very few stitches on
the needles right now. I have three needles flopping around with only six stitches total,
which means Iím ready to finish the top of the hat. The different sizes have a different number
of stitches left at the very end. This happens to be the child size. Letís take a look. There are my six stitches, and hereís my
working yarn. Iíve already cut my working yarn and left it about a foot long. For this Iím going to need a tapestry needle.
Just a big, blunt ended yarn needle, and these come in plastic and metal, you can get them
at about any craft store. Iím going to thread the yarn on the tapestry
needle. And my yarn is coming out of this stitch right
here. So just like when I was knitting this, Iím going to start with this one here. Iím going to thread the needle through the
two stitches on that needle, that knitting needle, pull it through. Go to the next one, thread it through those
two. And then the last two. And then we pull it tight, and thatís the
top of the cap. Weíre just about finished here. I want to take the needle, and push the end
through to the inside of the cap, because we need to weave in these ends to secure them. And there are different ways of weaving in
ends, but in this case, because we were working ribbing, the way that I would like to do it
is to find this row of knit stitches on the inside, it was purl on the other side, itís
knits on this side. And just pick up one leg of the V, kind of
half twisting it, for several stitches. And this will get the, the end secure, and
it also is a way of securing the end without, um, working across this way, which would make
the hat less stretchy. So Iíve pulled it through several stitches
there, and I can go ahead and cut the yarn short now. Done with that one. We still have one more end here, the very
beginning of the hat. Iím going to leave the hat inside out, thread
my needle, and do the same thing. Just picking up one leg of the V, half twisting
it, down for several stitches like that, and then
cutting it short. Turn it inside out and you have a finished
hat! Ready to go! So thatís how to make your first hat. Knitting
in the round, working on double pointed needles, all kinds of skills that you learned from
this project. Good luck. [music]
