A simple hat.

I made a hat, and I it was a dreadful experience in which I re-learned why I hate pom poms.

1. Pom-Pom making -even with a pom pom maker- is tedious business (I have this kind, and after looking into it, I think I might get one of these.)
2. I never know when to stop winding: my pom poms are always either much too stiff or much too floppy. (In this particular case it was too stiff on one side and too floppy on the other, which is not a good compromise. At all.)
3. I apparently also misjudge whether I should make a big pom pom or a small pom pom and end up wanting to make both so I can try it either way, which leads to my last and most important reason:
4. Pom poms waste yarn. You can never un-do a pom pom. Once that single ply hand dyed merino is gone, it's gone. It's cut into teeny tiny useless bits.

So let me just re-iterate for myself one more time: I HATE POM POMS!!! I think, actually, the deepest and richest irony is how much I love pom poms. I think they are so darn cute, and wish desperately that there was a perfect pom-pom making service in my town. Le Sigh...

The hat was just a whim of a thing, where I didn't have any good easy knitting to work on. You know, except the garter stitch scarf, the garter stitch washcloth, the simple cotton socks, or the hexipuffs.... OK OK I was desperate to start something new! At least it was something small...
I used size 7's, cast on 84 and worked for about 11" in k2,p2 ribbing (talk about simple), then I did the decreases as written in Hot Head because I was too lazy to do any thinking for myself. The yarn is really all that's worth talking about: Punta's Merisoft Hand-painted Aran. It was so delightful and squishy and wonderfully wooly. I got it when one of the yarn shops in Sacramento closed down, for half-off. I actually wish I'd bought more of it.