Granny Square Hat

 This little rolled brim hat was born out of an idea I had of: "What to do with a crocheted granny square." I had made a few granny squares last year, because I was thinking of crocheting a baby blanket using granny squares with a small pom pom in the center. I got side tracked and put the granny squares off to the side. Every time I would see them sitting, waiting to be finished, I kept thinking, "What can I do with these granny squares other than making a baby blanket." I love knitting baby hats, and it occured to me to take a granny square, pick up stitiches all along the outer edge of the square, place the stitches on a circular knitting needle and just start knitting in the round until I had a long enough hat for a baby. My idea worked!

So, as you can see in the photos, the granny square is the crown of the hat and the stitches are picked up by using a crochet hook inserted in each stitch around, pulling up a loop and then placing the new loop on the circular needles. Each loop counts as one stitch. I pull up 10 loops at a time, then slide the new stitches to the end of the crochet hook and then load them onto my circular needles, 10 at a time, until I have picked up all stitches around the granny square. Then place a marker to mark beginning of round and just start knitting. The size of the granny square will determine the size of hat you want to make. This one in the photo is done with a 4" granny square, which will make a newborn size hat, and about 60-62 stitches picked up around outer edge of square. I used worsted weight yarn and a size 9 circular needle. For a larger hat, crochet a larger granny square. Experiment with the sizes, and yarns and color changes all you want, you can probably come up with a lot of different looks. Click on photo to enlarge.