But (t)hat’s not a beret!
This is what I exclaimed to myself last night, after I finished my Rangoli beret, wore it and looked at myself in the mirror, and burst out laughing. The funny thing is that a little earlier, as I began the decreases for the beret, I held it up and said, hmm. It’s actually looking like it might be a bit too large, I hope it won’t end up too slouchy.
As you can see, slouchy it is not, nor is it a tam. But I am not going to tamper with it (heh heh) because I quite like what I ended up with. It’s a slightly loose-fitting hat, and on the walk over to school early this chilly morning, has established that it can keep my head from catching a cold without giving me hat hair. I love it, despite how off I was with my calculations. I’m going to soldier on with the pattern, but only after some more serious swatching. Here I stretched the cap out over a bowl so it looks a little larger than it actually is.
And here’s one of the crown:
I really liked the idea of the bobble for the dot, and the way I was able to separate the two lines of the petals by two purl stitches. The 8-petal division also works, but I might try a 12-petal division the next time. I also worked the decreases into the straight knit lines leading into the crown, which makes them look more raised and really gives them definition. Will retain that. One of the reasons the hat looks puffy but not shapeless, I think, is that the decreases are concentrated up at the crown. Will probably retain that too, since I like this more than the idea of a flattish beret.
I am not, however, happy with the way the two petal lines cross each other at the ends of the petals. I tried two tactics, and as you can see below, neither of which are neat enough and need some work. The single 1×1 rib clashes badly with the double petal lines, maybe a 2×2 twisted rib the next time.
But well, there you have it, my first FO of 2007. As I’ve probably said before on this blog, der aaye, durust aaye (Late, but worth it!)
EDIT: my apologies for the screwed up formatting, multiple pings and and the large photos. I really need to find another bloghost, this Typepad thing just won’t give me a correct preview.