Here’s a fun little stash-busting project I took on this past Christmas: Nibling Hats!
Are you familiar with the term “nibling?” I wasn’t until a few weeks ago. I was getting tired of saying “those hats I knit for my nephews and nieces” and I said to Aidan, it would be nice if there was a collective terms for “nephews and nieces” and he replied, “niblings.” Who knew? I mean, besides my kid, obviously 😀
So I will be calling those offspring of my siblings and siblings-in-law “niblings” forever, because how cute is that?
Back to the hats:
I decided to knit a Basic Beanie for each of my four nephews, and a slouchy Barley Hat for each of my four nieces, and my oldest nephew’s girlfriend. (Both patterns are from Tin Can Knits. More on that later.) That’s nine hats, and I had several skeins of Valley Yarns Northampton in three different colors that had been sitting in my stash for years. (I bought way too many skeins when I was planning my Vintersol, and I used some for my first Cogwheel, but still had a lot left over.)
I knit four in Dark Olive Heather, four in Sage Heather, and one in Stratosphere. For four of the girls’ hats, I also held the Northampton with a strand of mohair: three with white, and one with hot pink. And the three youngest girls got faux fur pompoms.
These four beanies went to my nephews, who range in age from two months old to thirty years! I varied the ribbing on these, using 2×2 for the first, 3×1 for the second, and 1×1 for the younger two.
And these are the girls’ hats. The Dark Olive went to my oldest nephew’s girlfriend (it matches the Dark Olive beanie I made for him). The other four went to my nieces, who range in age from seven to thirteen (not quite as dramatic of a range as the nephews, LOL). So for 13-year-old C, I held the Sage Heather with a strand of white mohair for a subtle halo. 10-year-old K got the only hat in Stratosphere, because I thought that blue-green would look so nice with her auburn hair. That one was also held with white mohair. 8-year-old E is a bit of a pink freak, so I held the Sage Heather with a strand of hot pink mohair, and I think the effect was pretty cool. You almost can’t tell that the base color of the hat is a pale gray-green at all. Lastly, 7-year-old K, got the same combination as C, but with a pale pink pompom on top.
E put her hat right on when she opened it 🙂 That was nice, because you never know how someone is going to like a hat, and I am well aware that I am probably way more excited about this project than the recipients were (which is why I slipped a gift card into each one, too, LOL). Technically, I think she may have the hat on backwards (I’ve always thought the garter stitch section should go in the front) but it doesn’t really matter one way or the other.
The Barley pattern is my favorite hat pattern for myself. I detest the way I look in beanies and hats that sit tight on my head, but I really like the slouchy style of these Barleys. I am very tempted to knit myself another one with the Dark Olive Heather and a strand of green or blue mohair 🤔
As I mentioned earlier, both of these patterns were from Tin Can Knits, and I used their fabulous app to knit them all. I am in love with this app. I love that it only shows me the size I am currently knitting, which means I don’t have to print out a copy of the pattern for each kid, and circle all of the right stitch counts. That’s huge. Think of all of the paper and effort saved on that alone!
I also don’t need a counter of any kind, because the app keeps track of where you are in a pattern.
Hats are relatively simple, but I’ve also used this app to knit a couple of sweaters, and it’s been fantastic for that, too. I can’t recommend it enough. I’m not being compensated to say that. I’m just a happy customer. I say “customer,” but the app is actually free. Sure, you have to pay for most of the patterns in the app, but you would have had to do that anyway without the app! I’m starting to babble. Time to wrap this up, LOL
I loved doing this project. It was a great stash-buster, and I loved having a gift that was appropriate for all ages from baby to thirty! And hey, I have evidence that at least one of them liked it, so that’s cool 🤣
