a two hat kind of day

Some days you just whip through a couple of stash busting projects, and one of those days was today. Boom! Two hats. Very gratifying.

I found myself rummaging through my yarn to see what I had that I could make fast holiday projects with and found these two chunky colorful yarns. For the red one, I used a pattern I saved on Pinterest a while back, and for the rainbow I repeated the very same pattern I had already used with this yarn to make myself a hat back in January. I love how they both turned out and they'll end up going to my nieces who are coming to visit. 

Of course, any hat could always use a pom pom. I don't add them to all of my hats, but I sure want to.  I snapped up these two pom poms at the local yarn shop, Continental Stitch, on Small Business Saturday (which was really fun to "celebrate" in Morgan Hill, by the way - so many great local shops!). I couldn't really decide which way I liked them best, so consulted the expert - Mom! She liked the black on red and buff on rainbow best. I didn't start out thinking that's how it would go but seeing both options side by side, I agree. I like that one is sort of Stanford pride and the other will be a nice way to go out together and "match" but hers will have a pom pom so will be way cooler than mine. Hope they like them!

Pattern for red hat: Chunky Catamount Beanie, free on Ravelry (my Ravelry page)

Yarn: Premier Yarns Serenity Chunky Prints in 'red ochre'

Needle: US 11 and US 13

Pattern for rainbow hat: Swirly Smooshy Chunky Beanie, free on Ravelry (my Ravelry page)

Yarn: Loops & Threads Facets in 'peridot'

Needle: US 13