by Maria C Collins

Created on: March 28, 2010   Last Updated: March 05, 2011

You want your children to wear hats in cold weather but they have a huge aversion to keeping them on the heads. Battling with your child over a hat is futile, and you can approach this by a different route, why not make your children hats that they will love to wear. There are many super crochet patterns for children’s hats, either to buy, or for free. If you involve your child in the choice of hat, he, or she, just might feel happier about wearing it.

You can find patterns for kid’s hats in many places. Try looking in your local public library; they often have a good selection of crochet books, many of which contain patterns. Look at women’s magazines and crochet magazines there are often lovely crochet patterns for children's hats in them. The internet is a wonderful resource for crochet patterns, both to buy, and for free. Remember that you never have to do the pattern exactly as it is written, you can adapt it to your child’s tastes. Whether your child likes a snazzy, simple, shaped, or novelty, hat, there are crochet patterns available.

Then go through your yarn mountain, go to the yarn shop, or shop for yarn online, and find a suitable yarn. You can buy all sorts of embellishments to jazz up your hat, patches, eyes, sparkly bits, fluffy balls, motifs, badges, or even a crochet flower or other raised design all can make your hat unique. You could crochet some beautiful crochet flowers.  

Many experienced crocheters, think that they know their tension, or gauge, and no longer need to make a tension square before they begin a project. When crocheting a child’s hat, tension (or gauge) is crucial, because size is so important. If your tension is only a tiny bit out, it can make a half-inch size difference to the finished hat, and on a child’s head that is huge.

If you are British look out for a pattern by a British designer called Dawn Inskip, she designed a novel leaflet of children’s hats some years ago. You could crochet a colourful Rasta hat, a bobble hat with a difference, or a snowman hat or what about a ponytail hat. For boys, a balaclava, or ski mask, will keep them warm whilst they play outside. There are a good selection of free patterns for boys and girls at crochet pattern central and even more at stargazer’s site. There are many imaginative free hat patterns at Ravelry, providing you sign up for a free account, and more patterns at Crochetville.

There are so many beautiful and practical crochet patterns for kids’ hats. Your child will enjoy wearing them and you will not have to worry that he, or she, removes the hat, when you are not looking. Grab a hook and some yarn and crochet an amazing hat today.

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