Wow 2011, the time sure does fly when you are 64. Tom explained it this way. When you are 6 one year is one 6th of you life experience so it seem very long. The summers seem endless when you are a child. Now that I am 64 one year is only one 64th of my life experience.

The summers fly by as do the winters. It is easy to just say I will fix that next year because next year is just around the corner.

So I look out my kitchen window into my sad garden covered with snow. The clutter of last years garden that for some reason just did not get cleaned up and put away before the snow started to fall is hidden by a blanket of white. This will be an ugly site when the snow melts. Will it be bad enough to get me out of the house early in March to clean up the mess so that the spring lettuce can sprout as it did last year? I had lettuce up in my boxes on St Patricks Day last year. I even posted pictures.

So it is January all ready and I am sitting in my warn cozy house knitting looking out at the snow falling. Lattice Hats in angora and wool. Knitting has dominated my days once again. I knitted 8 pair of mittens for gifts.

I became enthralled by a cabled hat pattern with lattice cables and have made variations of the design at least a dozen times, as you can see in the pictures posted. I tried one with a rolled brim, I tried various ways of decreasing the top. I put earflaps on a couple. I knit one with bulky yarn and a traditional folded brim. I tried different sizes of yarn and needle sizes 4-9.

I liked the sport or DK weight yarn hats knit on #5 - 7 needles best. I made 5 with angora blend DK weight yarn. I I made one out of baby pink Angora that I increased into a modified tam shape.

On the last one I am still knitting is with Noro Silk Garden Yarn. Pictured above. I changed to a large cable at the top. The variegated color and uneven spin of the handspun yarn sort of hides the stitch pattern.

I will keep knitting this lattice pattern as long as the ideas keep flowing. I want to try a few more tam variations. I will post more pictures. I do not have a pattern to share since each hat is different. You can begin as I did by knitting KOOLHAAS HAT by Jared Flood. The red hat pictured above was inspired by this pattern. I did not finish the top of my hat as Jared did in his pattern. I started with his pattern and once I got the cabled down I set the pattern aside and went on my own. I liked the way the hat fit but it ended up a bit too short. The second hat was the blue hat and it was too long. With each hat I made changes to alter shaping and size. Each hat is a little different due to changes in yarn, needle sizes and number of stitches. One idea leads to the next. Will I ever tire of knitting variations of this pattern and move back to socks? Check in here and see.