Tam O'Shanter

I crocheted this hat for my trip to Old Tucson for the Wild Wild West Steampunk Convention. I found the pattern here, and improvised. The pattern was for a certain yarn company, and didn't indicate yardage or weight for the type of yarn they recommended beyond spools of silk. They recommended 4 spools. The pattern also did not mention a size for the crochet hook.

I went to Hobby Lobby and picked out a silk/bamboo thread which just felt yummy. I'm sure it is a heavier thread than the silk they worked with, but I picked from what was there, and the silk/bamboo just felt right. I went home and picked a size D hook from my stash, and went to work on the hat.

Most of the hat is worked in double crochet, and I worked fairly tightly because I wanted it to be dense. I followed the pattern and I am pretty happy with the size, although I suspect with the yarn I used, it is larger than the ones originally made. That being said, there were two basic places that my hat is different than the pattern. The first is that I made the head opening smaller, only by about 2 rows, but also with decreases in those two rows. Then I didn't continue the band as far as the pattern said. I think I did 10 rows, and the pattern said 15. I ended up using 4 spools of the silk/bamboo. Huh. Go figure.

I enjoyed wearing the hat, and it has enough brim to keep the sun out of my eyes, at least somewhat. It isn't heavy enough to be hot, and I didn't even get horrible hat hair. I will probably decorate it a little, when I find something I like, and something steam punky. I decided no pom-pom, though.