I'm sure you've seen plenty of tutorials for these adorable little hats, made from nothing but yarn and paper tubes. Honestly, I never, ever, expected to make anything, (let alone something cute), from a toilet paper tube, so I began this project with astonishment. When my daughter saw these little hats, she insisted that her "Baby" bear needed one, but to make it work, we had to add ties. Easy-peasy. I'm killin' this mom-gig this morning! But I needed to make these little guys my very own... So I gathered supplies. And by "I," I mean, I said, "Hey, Rowan... under the sink, in my bathroom, is your box of hair beads. Will you please bring that down to me?" You could use any beads, but I have hundreds of beads with wider holes to fit my daughter's braids, so I used those.
All you need to make the hat is yarn, which I picked up at Walmart, a toilet paper cardboard roll complements of Charmin, and scissors. I used the twine to make a garland, but that step is completely optional. For this project, we are not using the twine.
While Rowan went for the beads, I used her sticker book to measure my yarn. I usually cut way too much for one hat, but better too much than too little. Then I cut my cardboard tubes in thirds.
As in all of the other hat tutorials, you do the following: 1. Fold the yarn in half, and threading the folded end through the center of the tube. 2. Open the fold and reach through with your index finger and thumb. 3. Grasp the ends of the yarn and pull through. Make the yarn snug, but don't pull too tightly. You want the yarn to be fluffy. Also, this is just toilet paper cardboard... it's not the strongest thing in the world. If you pull too tightly, you might bend it.
This is where my mind began to wander... as the pastor at my church says, in a chant... "ADD is a blessing. ADD is a blessing..." I am pretty sure there is something to this.
I didn't want to spend time looking for an embroidery needle, (say it with me this time... ADD IS A BLESSING!), and my yarn was too thick to easily feed through the beads. But I found this tiny piece of pipe cleaner just laying on the table next to my scissors. I kid you not, I have no idea what it was doing there... but it was the happiest thing that happened to me since coffee this morning!
I made a little J shape, and pinched the short end around the yarn I wanted to feed through the bead. I slipped the bead over the long end of the J, and pulled the yarn through.
As you can see, I used an ABAB pattern with blue and white beads. I only did one row, but you can do whatever floats your boat.
Next, I tied off the top ends with another length of yarn, just like the other tutorials.
I trimmed the top to make a pompom... again... just like the other tutorials. I did not trim the pompom tie ends till I tied my hat around the twine that formed my garland.
I LOVE the way this ties in with my little snowman beaded garland. I have more snowman garland that has navy and aqua bead separators, so the blue and white in my hats is an outstanding addition!
What do you think? Worth a try?