I was recently with my mum in Brockville, Ontario, where I grew up.  I desperately needed some yarn to work out an idea I was percolating.  We visited a wool store called the Woolly Lamb (at 56 Louis St just north of the train station).  It was my kind of wool store with lots of stock and a woman sitting in a big comfy chair knitting happily.  I got the wool I was looking for and saw the dollar bin of yarn.  I consider these bins to be a personal challenge so I bought some balls of furry yarn.  You know the stuff–all the rage about 3 incarnations of novelty yarn ago.  I first knitted some hats with vaguely similar stuff on the magic bus when I was in New Zealand with my family on our big trip  6 years ago…

I was taken by the richness of these colours together…I am a sucker for pure hues.  I used a 5 stitch cable variation for the black body of the hat, which I knitted in worsted weight yarn (Patons classic wool).  After 16 rows I switched to the novelty yarn and knit 4 rows of each colour separated by one row of black between colours.  I then returned to the black cabling and put a rose on the top.  I will be posting instructions for the rose in a day or so.