Mesh hat for a student

I like teaching. I have taught at universities before and after I left academia, I taught crocheting lessons so that I can continue teaching. Teaching a skill is a bit different from teaching ideas and concepts alone. It's a new challenge and I love it.

I advertise my crocheting classes on www.Skillbuddies.com, and that got me a student who asked me to show her how to crochet a hat. I was so thrilled. I hadn't taught a class in a couple of months and I had really missed the process. It was late spring, so no one else had shown much interest in craft activities.

It happened that she wasn't a real beginner and she was very dexterous. I showed her double crocheting stitches and how to increase, so that she could make a real hat. I was impressed to she her "get it" so quickly. Interestingly, she finds it rather difficult to adjust the pattern to get the right fit. Interesting because that is the part I find easiest - I struggle to stay with the pattern as I get imaginative while crocheting and start to modify it as I like. I suspect that it may be me that made the adjustment process harder for my student to understand - it is harder to teach something you do by feeling; I wasn't using any objective measurement (like counting stitches) to determine when I needed to adjust. Next time I crochet out of pattern, I should pay more attention to what I do so that I can teach better than the Let-your-inspiration-guide-you! step....

Anyway, a couple weeks after that class, she asked me if I could teach her how to make a mesh hat. I had never crocheted mesh patterns, so I consulted my Crocheting Bible book, got the mesh pattern, calculated the increase and voila! I had my mesh cap.
Well, teaching that wasn't so easy. Modifying a mesh pattern, from what I figured, involves changing the stitch numbers of every mesh; a single change has a global consequence. So making any adjustments involves a lot of planing ahead. I did a lot of calculation, and still had to adjust here and there as I went. When I was teaching this process to my student, I realized that it is a lot of brain work - possibly too much - for someone who is still learning the new stitches and the basis patters to pay attention to all the possible alternatives while crocheting. So I learned something: when I teach a new pattern/new stitch, I should use a fixed pattern that does not require on-the-go adjustments. It should make the learning process easier.

A hat with bobbles

"Experimental" is how I would describe my crochet style. I often crochet without consulting a pattern and just follow my intuitions. However, a lot of my intuitions are probably guided by the patterns I saw somewhere on the web. A lot of patterns I look at are listed in Crochet Pattern Central.

I like special stitches. They break the monotony of doing the same stitches all around. So I enjoyed making this hat, which has bobbles spread at every 10 stitches in every second row. I thought I was going to be clever so the bobble happens at the 10th stitch first round, then at the 5th, to spread them in an "interesting" way.

The result? I am not sure. It looks kind of bumpy.

My favorite crochet project - hats

My mom taught me very basic crocheting stitches when I was a child. So I knew how to make chain, single and slip stitches. The problem then was, however, I didn't know about turing chains or increases/decreases. I tried to make squares and they all came out some sort of quadrilateral. I was puzzled, and then lost interest when I got a pile of quadrilateral pieces that I couldn't find any use for. I wasn't really experimental back then. So it was only when my friend (the same one that showed me how to knit - Goodness bless her!) showed me her crochet works that I appreciated the possibilities of crocheting. She also taught me doubles, half doubles, and the way to increase and decrease stitches. Sooo many possibilities opened all the sudden!

I think I made this hat in two evenings. I put a pom-pom on the side. I am very happy with this hat - I still wear it.

My first knitted hat

My friend taught me to knit in 2005. After making a few practice patches, my first project was a hat. She told me to get the gauge (which I never did. I just went by the feeling.) and start knitting in rounds.

I started with a circular needle, no ribbing. So the end curls up a bit. Then I started to decrease and switched to double-pointed needles when the round became too small for the circular needle. Simple, except that I used beginner's yarn. It's supposed to be good for beginners because, if you mess it up a bit, it doesn't show. I don't know why that is a good thing. I prefer to see my stitches. If you are a good counter, you can keep track of the number of stitches and know when to do the decrease. I find it easier to see where the decreases happen, so I like simpler, straighter yarn. I liked the pattern, so I continued to knit more hats until I discovered the joy of crocheting.