Headband with a Twist
Knitting something cool for someone picky.
What do you knit for someone who cares about what they look? Sylvia’s gift was difficult to pick because her and I differ in terms of style and I knew she probably wouldn’t want a frumpy labor of love that resulted in mom’s first hat. A nice, thick headband seemed like a good compromise.
Project Info:
Pattern: Drops Winter Smiles Headband
Yarn: Heathered Tweed by Loops & Threads, platinum colorway, polyester and acrylic blend, light weight
Needles: US 8 DPNs
Misc: endurance
At first glance, this headband looks exceedingly easy. And in hindsight, it really was. But I didn’t realize just how long this thing would take. Knitting 44 stitches (double strand) in the round until the tube measures approx. 20-22 inches. In other words, a slog.
But the yarn feel was nice and I got very good practice with the double pointed needles (something I missed out on with the Simple Hat). The twist is that the tube is sewn together by wrapping the two ends around each other, making a sort of aesthetic twist in the front. The resulting headband was super thick, thanks to the double strand and double layer construction, and very soft.
Admittedly, the original idea for this headband was to make 2 versions with the same pattern, one for Sylvia and one for Jessica. The pattern was worked with double strands so I had the idea to knit using two colors (red and white for Sylvia, teal and white for Jessica). About 4 inches into Jessica’s headband, I started to run out of white yarn. So I swapped out the white for green (which clashed horribly with the teal) and continued…until I ran out of teal. And so on and so forth. I even frogged a garter stitch sample to extend the tube with the teal (because after declaring the headband DONE 3 times, each time it was too tight when sewn together). Not to mention the fact that the yarns were not the same material (cotton, acrylic), resulting in sections that stretched a lot next to sections that did not, so the headband took on a freakish, Frakenstein (‘s monster) appearance and I declared it too ugly for wear. Good for practice, bad for gift giving.
