Sno Cap Hood scarf

Brioche knits are drop-dead gorgeous. But even though I'm a fairly skilled knitter, I just have never really been able to wrap my head around the technique.

Sometimes it is possible to substitute the fisherman's rib stitch in place of brioche rib. This lovely hooded scarf, by little quail handcraft, designed in a simple brioche rib, seems to be a suitable candidate for that substitution, so I'm going to give it a try that way. 😊 Using the fisherman's rib stitch makes this pattern accessible for me. If you are able to knit in brioche, go for it! 

It has been a few years since the last time I worked in fisherman's rib, so I used the video and blog tutorials by Davina Choy of Sheep & Stitch to refresh my memory for how to work this easy, squishy stitch.

For the yarn, I am cannibalizing this poncho project that I crocheted in 2022. It weighs about 512 grams, which, by weight, works out to approximately the equivalent of 4 skeins of this yarn. Those 4 skeins weren't quite enough to finish the poncho to my satisfaction, even though I really liked the way the project was coming along (and I believe the Eggplant/Taupe colorway had already been discontinued, and I didn't feel like searching around online to try to buy more), so my poncho sat in purgatory for about four years while I figured out what else I wanted to make with this fiber.

From poncho to Sno Cap Hood

Fair warning: There is enough of a wool halo in this yarn to frequently make it difficult to rip back. Also, there is a lot of variability in the thickness of this yarn from the way it's spun, which almost gives it a homespun character. 

Variable thickness in the fiber

I don't have the labels anymore, but from what I can see online, each of these skeins is supposed to be about 312 yards, so I should have more than enough on hand to knit a Sno Cap Hood, even with my mods to increase the size.

I deviated from the pattern by starting off with a scarf width of 25 stitches, because I prefer my scarves to be on the wider side. At this gauge, that is giving me a scarf that's about 6 inches wide, which is a fairly standard scarf width.

After knitting a couple of inches, I realized that I was not happy with the way the selvedge stitches were sitting, so I ripped back to the beginning and switched from working the slipped-stitch selvedges (as per the pattern) to working them in garter stitch. At least for the fiber that I'm working with here, having garter stitch selvedges looks better, so I'm glad I noticed early on how I felt about the edges and was able to make the change before I got so far along that ripping back would have been more painful. Sometimes you just have to go with what the personality of your fiber is saying. 😂

Before starting the hood increases, I knitted the length of the first scarf tail to about 36 inches, which was about 162 rows at the gauge I'm working with this fiber. 

To work the fisherman's rib double increases/decreases for the hood portion, this video tutorial by Carolina of So Wooly is the perfect guide for executing that technique. She also provides a written tutorial of the technique on her blog.

At first the hood increases seem counterintuitive because they alternate between being worked on the right side and the wrong side (and the center stitch "moves" each time, but I really can't explain it; you just have to do it and trust the pattern), but if you follow the pattern as written (because it's correct, of course!) and also "read" your knitting as you go, you'll soon be able to tell the rows where you need to increase. Once you start knitting the increases section, and you're able to see how it comes together, you will see how the instructions make sense and keep you making the increases on the knit side of the center stitch. 

Increases

I did make some mistakes as I was working the increase section. If you look closely at my photo of the increases, you can see where I increased on the wrong stitch a few times. But since I was able to stay in the ribbing pattern, those mistakes are not super obvious, thank goodness. Whew! 😅 The ribbing is somewhat forgiving of a few small mistakes. Using a couple of removable markers to mark the center section (and moving them after each increase/decrease) can help a lot. 

Love the phasing of the colors

I increased to a total of 57 stitches for the hood (or 11 increases). Not only do I prefer my scarves to be on the wider and longer side, but I also prefer my hoods to be amply sized to fit over my hair, which I usually wear up in a messy bun style. Plus, the extra depth will keep the back of my neck extra cozy when the hood is down, so win-win!

Another foot to go

As a natural English-style knitter, I am always Majestically Awkward 🦩 while knitting in any type of rib stitch, so I won't often take on an entire project in rib stitch, but this hooded scarf is definitely worth it. 💜 I love to watch videos of continental-style knitters working; it's hypnotically beautiful to me. And I have tried multiple times to retrain my hands to knit continental style (I comprehend how they're doing it), but my hands just simply refuse to cooperate because they know that they can already knit just fine in English style, thank you very much. 🤦 Oh well, I'll probably keep trying from time to time to learn continental style, and maybe someday it will stick for me. 😂 

In addition to this Sno Cap Hood, I was able to knit two other coordinating projects using the yarn from the poncho project: a Freja cowl and a messy-bun hat based on the Endless Texture Brim Hat design.

Matching accessories

 

The Simple Thing plus hood

If you like the look of the Sophie Scarf, then give this free pattern for The Simple Thing by Melina Brell a try.

I ended up cannibalizing the yarn and needles from my attempt to make the Slice of Goodness Wrap by Purl Soho to make this project. I really, really wanted to finish Slice of Goodness, but the process was going to be very lengthy, and even though I made it to around halfway through, I lost the will to go on.

Gauge shot

I had been aware of the Sophie Scarf design for a while, but that design by itself didn't intrigue me, mainly because I don't like short scarves. I do like i-cord edges and garter stitch, however. So when the Sophie Hood version was released, that's when I started getting interested.

So my plan is to see if I can approximate the hooded version of this scarf by using The Simple Thing as my starting point.

HeathlandKnits has a good video tutorial on YouTube that walks you through the setup process for The Simple Thing scarf, and I highly recommend that you watch that video when casting on. There is also a video showing how to graft the ends together when finishing the scarf. Both of the video links included in the PDF of the pattern appear to be broken, so that's why I'm sharing the links with you here. It took me a bit of clicking around to find them.

Part 1 done

Because I prefer my scarves on the longer side, I'm making this using a 6-row repeat instead of the basic 4-row repeat suggested in the pattern. Whatever length you prefer for your pattern repeat, definitely use a stitch marker that opens/closes as a progress keeper! This almost becomes a mindless knit with the help of a progress keeper clipped to your project. 

Part 2 starts with a buttonhole

I originally planned to have the scarf part be at least 30 to 36 inches long and around 10 inches wide on each side before starting on the hood part. The way I'm visualizing this coming together, I'll have to knit each scarf side before joining them together to knit the hood. I haven't done that sort of thing before, so we'll see if it works. 🤞

Parts 1 and 2 complete

Part 1 ended up being about 27 inches long by 9.5 inches wide at widest end, or 50 stitches (not counting i-cord stitches) by 296 rows. I started part 2 by making a buttonhole at the tip, which required it to be a bit wider than the tip of part 1, so I knitted a few rows without increasing part 2 until the width at that length was about the same as on part 1, and then I continued the same increasing pattern (every 6 rows) as on part 1 until achieving the same overall width and length.

Before grafting the i-cord edging

After joining the two sides to begin the hood (and adding stitches along the i-cords at the back of the neck for a comfortable fit), I ended up with 120 stitches on the needle, not counting the i-cord stitches on each edge of the work. This will give me a hood with enough depth to comfortably fit over my hair, which I usually wear up in a messy bun style. 

Start of part 3

There is a Sophie Hood video tutorial that shows some key techniques for that pattern, and in watching that video, it's clear that I'm using a different method to knit the hood for my project. They knit the hood flat (in line with the scarf) and have a seam to join the entirety of the sides of the hood at the back; I'm also knitting my hood flat, but I'm doing mine seamlessly (bottom up) except for where the top edge will be grafted. 

Rescue line added before starting hood decreases

I debated for a while how to work the top of the hood, meaning whether I would attempt to make the back part slightly shaped/rounded with short rows or decreases. Finally, I found this video tutorial by Yuha Knitting that shows an easy-to-understand method for making decreases to help make the back of a hood knitted like mine a bit rounded, so it looks less pointy on the wearer's head. I think I'll try doing mine that way. (I could also envision a method of working short rows on either side of the center of the back of the hood to shape the crown that way, but I just didn't want to work that hard, so I'm glad I found the technique by Yuha Knitting!)

Hood complete with crown decreases

To prepare for the decreases, I added a marker to show where the center of the back of the hood was, and I will make the hood decreases on either side of that marker. I also added a marker to show when I was working a right-side row, since I intended to work decreases only on the right side of the work. Lastly, I added a rescue line in the last row before starting to decrease, just in case I wasn't happy with how the decreasing section was going. It would be easy to rip back and start the section again if needed. 😂 The decrease before the marker will be a left-leaning decrease (SSK), and the decrease after the marker will be a right-leaning decrease (K2tog).

Hood complete with top seam closed

I calculated that I wanted to decrease the crown of the hood by about 40 stitches (about one-third of the hood's total width), which, decreasing 2 stitches on each right-side row, would require 40 rows to achieve. (With decreases worked only on right-side rows, every decreasing row is followed by a non-decreasing row on the wrong side, so 20 decreasing rows plus 20 non-decreasing rows equals 40 rows total.) Based on my estimated gauge, those 40 rows would add about 3.5 inches of height to the hood. And since I wanted the total height of my hood to be about 13-14 inches (measuring from the top of my shoulder to the crown of my head), that meant that I should knit about 10 inches of hood before starting the decreasing rows.

Time to add a button

I also found a nice tutorial by Lindsey of the Yarina blog hosted by Custom Yarn that shows how to join the top of a hood knitted in garter stitch like mine using a 3-needle bind-off technique that blends invisibly into the established garter stitch. Woo-hoo! I'm going to try doing that, too.

Button info

A Chicken for Suzanne

My dear friend Suzanne is a self-proclaimed "chicken gal" and suburbanite-of-necessity who longs to return to her farmgirl days living in the country with a yard full of chickens.

What better way to celebrate her upcoming birthday than sending an Emotional Support Chicken for her to hug and hold while she dreams her sweet farmgirl dreams?

The Emotional Support Chicken by Annette Corsino is just a downright fun pattern to knit, and I think it looks best when executed in tweedy-ish yarn colorways that are reminiscent of the feathers of real chickens. When I saw the lovely marled colorways of KnitPal Cotton to the Core, I just knew they would produce some lovely chickens well worth adding to any metaphorical flock. For this hen, I'm using Caramel Brown as color A and Fresh Peach as color B.

This yarn is on the lighter side for being labeled as a worsted weight - definitely much lighter than the stuff that Red Heart labels as worsted weight. In my opinion, it's closer to being DK weight. I'm still using the needle size specified in the pattern, though, so we'll see how big this hen ends up being compared to the other ones I've knitted with Red Heart. 😅 

I hope Suzanne loves her new chicken, and if she gives it a name, I will update this post to let all y'all know what it is! 💜🐔💜

I'm pretty sure that Suzanne's chicken is the first one of these that I've managed to sew together according to the way the pattern designer intended. Yay!

Emotional Support Chicken

I just couldn't resist the allure of the Emotional Support Chicken any longer. Meet Scrappy Henrietta! 😍

This pattern arrived on the knitting scene sometime in 2023 or 2024 (I believe), and the internet practically EXPLODED with excitement.

I added the pattern to my Ravelry favorites for safe-keeping but decided to wait before making one. I noticed, however, as the months went by the way the emotional support chicken consistently remained on the first page of Ravelry's "hot right now" designs, suggesting that the internet's adoration for the ESCs had yet to abate. It was on FIRE.

Eventually, I just couldn't resist the pull of the ESC any more.  

I think the thing that put me over the edge was when I discovered that The Knitting Tree LA had made a companion video for the pattern. Checking out the video was my undoing. 😂

Tail part 1

I grabbed a long old scrap of Hobby Lobby's I Love This Yarn in the Jazzy Stripe colorway (left over from an Infinite Granny Square afghan project) and cast on to follow along with the video, which starts at the tail.

Tail part 2

For part 2 of the tail and the main part of the body, I used a couple of long scraps of Red Heart With Love in the Pewter Gray colorway that were left over from when I made my Autumn Mists vest with no pattern.

Tail and main body

I don't know which yarn I used for the neck and head, but it was one long scrap of an ombre-ish yarn with purple, dark pink, and raspberry colors that is probably something by Red Heart, but I didn't have a label for it anymore.

Neck and head added

I used up the remainder of the raspberry ombre scrap for the top end of the undersection piece, and more of the gray yarn to finish the undersection.

Henrietta got a bit wonky as I was sewing her up, where the two ends of her neck stripes don't line up at the front, but hey. She is still adorable, and I wuv her!! She has 15 mm blue safety eyes from a pack that I bought off Etsy years ago from a seller named 6060, who is no longer active on the site. Whenever I'm installing safety eyes, I always use this tool to help set the backs, because it makes it a lot easier for my arthritic hands to handle the task of snapping them on securely.

You might be able to knit a whole ESC by only watching the video, but I think the video really makes a better accompaniment if you also own the written pattern, so before I reached the end of the first tail section, I bought the pattern: And the emotional support chicken claimed yet another willing (happy) victim. 😂

I followed this up by making a friend for Scrappy Henrietta, another Emotional Support Chicken, Scrappy Patty, in colors to match our guest bedroom.

Scrappy Patty and Scrappy Henrietta

 

Scrappy Patty sitting on the bed in our guest bedroom

Scrappy Patty side view

Entries for the fair

This year, I entered two knitted items in our state fair's needle arts competition: a gray version of my Shawlcowl Pullover made with acrylic DK yarn and a blue fingering-weight version of the Zuzu's Petals pullover cowl.

The gray Shawlcowl Pullover got some really nice, thoughtful feedback from the judges.

But, amazingly, the blue Zuzu's Petals earned an Honorable Mention ribbon! As well as some lovely judges' feedback.

 

 

 

Naturally, the entry made by the co-owner of our local little yarn shop took best in show! Way to go, Irina!!! 😍

Irina's entry

 I wonder what I should make to enter into the fair for next year?!?!?