Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Flickr Friends: Jenni from Just Stuff

I'm Jenni from Just Stuff and only discovered Project Run and Play this past spring.  Like everyone else, I find it very inspiring and my sewing skills have grown just by participating in the sew-a-long group.  I was pretty excited to be invited to post a tutorial this month and have been hard at work on:  The Honeymoon Hat.  Seventeen years ago this month my husband and I were married.  He was still in school and I had started my first year teaching.  Needless to say, we were pretty broke and didn't have a lot of time to take for our honeymoon, either.  We were married on a Saturday morning and we were both back at school by Tuesday.  I shared with my freshmen English students that we saw a great movie, Toy Story, that weekend.  They were appalled!  "You saw a movie on your honeymoon!?!"  I knew what they were implying, so I said, "It's not like that takes the whole time."  Imagine if they knew we went shopping, too!  Because I bought the best winter hat that weekend made of felted wool and I have never seen one in a store since.  Luckily, it has held up all this time, but this winter I am recreating it in a variety of materials.
Everything I sew comes from secondhand materials, whether they are thrift store and garage sale finds or remnants from other people's projects.  This tutorial features a hat made from t-shirts, but the same pattern works for old sweaters, sweatshirts, and fleece.  I have also experimented with some groovy suit fabric, but it doesn't have any stretch and I haven't developed a consistent pattern for it yet.  So, after you have settled on some fabric with some stretch, you are going to cut out panels for the main part of the hat.
 








For a hat sized 0-2T cut one 5x6" and four 3x6" rectangles (five panels total) and one 6" circle.

For a hat sized 3T-7 cut one 5x7" and four 4x7" rectangles (five panels total) and one 7 1/2" circle.

For a hat sized 8&up cut one 5x8" and five 4x8" rectangles (six panels total) and one 9" circle.
Pin and sew panels together (if your fabric has a right side, do it right sides together) creating the body of the hat.  When pinning, take care to line up the tops of the panels that will eventually be sewn to the circle to form the crown of the hat.  It does not matter if the bottoms of your rectangles are uneven, as they will just get folded up into the brim.  Many people feel you can only work with knit fabric if you have a serger, but a zig zag on top of a straight stitch is really just as effective.
You can now pin the circle to the hat.  Turn the body of the hat inside out and begin pinning the edge of the circle to the tops of your rectangle.  I sew around first with a straight stitch, and then go back over it with a zig zag to give it a little more structure.


 






Flip the hat right side out and finish with another zig zag around the exposed crown of the hat.  This step is optional if you like the shape of the hat without it.  Again, I like the structure it adds to the hat.  These sew up pretty quickly (30 to 45 minutes) and although the original Honeymoon Hat shows no signs of wear and tear, it will be nice to have some different color choices.

Be sure to check out Jenni's blog HERE for more great second-hand projects and ideas!!!  You will love what she does to give older materials a new life.....it's so fantastic.


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2 comments :

  1. Cute hat, love to make one for my son who has a big head and other hats slip right off. Plus, he gets hot quickly in knitted hats so maybe jersey will provide him with just the right amount of warmth.

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  2. So cute. My girls have lots of thick hair, so this hat will work perfectly for them.

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