This pattern is retired and not usually available. However, I make many of my retired patterns available for a few days twice a year, and this is one of those times! It will be available from now through some time on Monday, December 2. Then it will go away again.

In the summer of 2022, I realized that I found maintaining a back catalog of hundreds of patterns overwhelming. I couldn’t do it and still release new things. So I took my old patterns down so I could keep doing new work.

A few favorites have come back, and lots of new things have come out! But the vast majority of the old patterns are retired and are no longer generally available.

However, enough folks have asked about old favorites that I make many of the retired patterns available for a few days twice a year (usually in early summer and around Thanksgiving).

• If you see the buy buttons on this page, you’ve caught it on one of the days it’s available!
• If you don’t see the buy buttons on this page, then it’s not currently available.
• If you want to hear when the retired patterns are available, subscribe to the mailing list or patreon, or keep an eye on my instagram.

Stochastic adjective having a random distribution that may not be predicted

Ok look. Maybe you’re currently working on something breathtakingly intricate. Something with beads and cables and lace and six different colors of yarn and steeks and very possibly a zipper somewhere in there. And if you are, that’s great! I’m happy for you! I hope you adore what you’re working on!

But I? I kinda need to just knit. Just make one stitch after the other. No counting. No being glued to a chart. No hard rows where I need to make sure I have good light and my glasses handy. No cable needle to lose. Just knit and knit and knit. But with just enough going on to keep me entertained, because somehow I will get distracted if there’s nothing but stockinette.

If you’re right there with me, I think I have the perfect hat for you.

Work a brim (there are three different ones in there), then sit back and knit in beautiful, meditative stockinette until you come to a colorful stretch of yarn. Work a tiny bit of magic! Then go back the stockinette. Keep clipping along like that until it’s time for the decreases (there are three different ones of those too).

It’s quick and easy and yet somehow still deeply satisfying. I knit all three, and I’m still sort of wanting to make more!

A quick note about the yarn: These hats were made with yarn specially dyed by Gauge Dye Works for this pattern. You’ll find it here. One skein of that yarn will make any one of the three hats included in this pattern.

However, you don’t have to use that yarn to make these hats. You can absolutely make this pattern with two (or more) yarns (a background color to work most of the stitches in and a contrast color or colors to make the fancy bits in) instead of one specially dyed yarn. The pattern includes detailed instructions on how to do that.

You’ll want about 50 yards of your contrast color (or colors if you want more than one, it’s fine if it’s a bit less, this is a great way to use up leftovers from other projects) and about 175-200 yards of your background yarn. All the yarns need to be about the same weight as each other. And you can use any weight of yarn that gives you a fabric you like at one of the included gauges (that means pretty much anything from heavy fingering up through heavy worsted should be fine).

You can, if you’re truly craving simplicity, even knit the whole thing in one single yarn with no color changes at all, which is lovely and understated! And there are suggestions in there too for how to use a long gradient skein to make something marvelous.

Now, someone out there is probably wondering if a particular yarn in their stash with short bursts of color on it will work. And the truth is, I can’t say for sure. Both the size and the placement of the blips on the Gauge Dye Works yarn were designed with this pattern in mind. I can’t promise that other yarns with scattered bits of color will behave exactly the same way in this pattern.

That doesn’t mean they won’t work! The pattern is super flexible and quite adaptable, and I included a whole bunch of info on how to use other yarns, so there’s a good chance they will! But it does mean that I can’t make promises about the precise behavior of other yarns.

I can tell you the yarn Gauge Dye Works yarn that was built for this hat works. I can tell you that using two separate yarns works. I can tell you that using one uniform yarn works. And I can tell you that there are a lot of ways to tweak the hats in the pattern. But I truly can’t tell you for sure if XYZ Yarn Company’s new Wonderful Worsted in the Darn Nifty colorway will work.

But this really is tremendously flexible, and I don’t think you’ll have any trouble at all finding yarn you’ll love it in!

The hat is written in ten sizes (castons of 96, 100, 104, 108, 112, 116, 120, 124, 128, or 132 stitches), and you should feel free to adjust your gauge a bit to fine tune the fit of the hat. Just be sure that you’re working at a gauge that gives you a fabric you like with your chosen yarn!

I recommend working at something around 5, 5.5, 6, or 6.5 stitches per inch, and I’ve included a table to help you figure out what gauge you’ll want to use for your size. With that range of sizes and gauges, the hat will fit a head between 19.5 and 25.25 inches (with lots of points in between).

And don’t worry, the fancy stitch looks tricky, but it’s shockingly easy. Plus I’ve got pages and pages of step-by-step photos to help you make it (along with blocking, troubleshooting, and yarn selection tips to make sure you have an easy time). You can totally do this!

This is perfect for you if:

• You’d really really really like to turn your brain off for a few minutes and just chill
• You’ve suddenly realized you have the absolute perfect yarn for this

It’s not for you if:

• You don’t like charts (the pattern uses charts, but wow are they delightfully easy charts, so even if you’re usually a little leery of them, I bet you can manage these)
• You hate swatching (you need to swatch to check your needle size)