making a santa hat

This was one of those quick-and-easy projects that somehow gets out of hand, like when you think you might quickly scoot the bookcase to the other side of the room but first have to remove the books, of course, and 4 hours later find yourself reorganizing your entire library, making 8 separate bags for all the places and people you plant to pass some of the extras to. And then, since the bookcase is now empty, you realize you may as well sand it down and paint it the color you'd always planned…but um, now the curtains clash with the new color and must be replaced.

Does this ever happen to you? Please tell me it does.

*****

C has a large head which can't fit into any of our Santa hats. He asked me to make him one, and I agreed. An hourlong project, I figured.

The fabric store didn't have the red fur he requested, but it did have all its "soft and fluffy fabrics" (yes, I believe that is the tailor's term) discounted 50%. So I brought some home and started cutting.

Then I noticed that the red fabric was kind of floppy. I thought I might add a little something to give it heft and spied some leftover cotton batting on the sewing shelf. And then I realized that C, once one of those children who was seriously disturbed by seams, was even at 18 not going to like having a bulky one touching his head. I decided to make the batting into a lining. (Why at this point I didn't switch to a more suitable fabric is beyond me. I blame my fuzzy, congested head.)

I had also neglected to get a pom-pom and realized that none of the white yarn I had was going to work with the creamy, textured fur of the brim. Thank goodness for the internet.

The entire project ended up being only mildly more involved than sewing the fur-trimmed cone I'd originally envisioned; but you know how it is when you're revising the project along the way instead of planning it well in the first place. Maybe you run into the dinner hour, have to clear everything from the kitchen table and set it up again after the dishes are done…and perhaps the son who wanted the hat also decides he needs his long hair shaved down to stubs that very night—10 pm!—and since the last time you shaved his head was 9 years ago, the clippers are rusty and an impromptu trip to town must be made for a new pair. And it turns out you've forgotten how to use clippers, anyway, so must make several ungainly passes before you get the hang of it.

This is how a one-hour project ends up lasting till midnight. 

But maybe you can learn from my ineptitude and make your Santa hat in 30 minutes—it really shouldn't take much longer than that. Below is exactly how I made it, with notes of what I'd do differently next time in italics:

materials and tools

Red cap fabric 2/3 yard

White trim fabric 1/4 yard

lining fabric, same as red cap fabric

(note: in retrospect, I think 1/2 yd of red is plenty for most hats. C has that large diameter head and I was going for proportion. And 1/4 yd of trim fabric felt a little tight—I might get 3/8 yd of that. It depends on your preference, of course. Also, while scrap batting worked fine for the lining, I regret that I didn't think to use a real fabric rather than what is essentially needle-punched cotton fluff.)

scissors

thread

stuffing for the pom-pom

(I used scrap fabric but would have preferred a lighter-weight polyester stuffing if I'd had it)

hot glue/glue gun

I used a machine, but this could easily be handsewn. Seams are arbitrarily 1/2" wide. Also, I apologize for my photos, which were taken in the poor artificial light of our house. As it got darker, the photo color became harsher and more contrasty, but I hope you can at least see the steps.

steps

1. Measure your head. Remember to measure it both around the crown and as the hat will be worn (from the nape of the neck to the forehead) and choose the larger measurement. You can either use a measuring tape or the trim fabric itself. C's head measures 24" but when we wrapped the fur around to see what felt comfortable, he found he actually liked it being 26" around.

2. Cut trim fabric to to width, adding 1/2" seam allowance to each end. The height will be determined by the yardage you have, although you may certainly want to square it up. In this photo, my trim fabric is the 9" (1/4 yd) folded in half to 4-1/2" high. It is then folded in half across, with a 13-1/2" width cut. With 1/2" wide seam, that will make 26" diameter band for the trim.

3. Pin right sides together, and sew the raw edge of the trim. Turn it right side out. (Another amendment: I see that what I did here was double the fabric, fold it again, and sew 4 thicknesses together. It would have been far easier to open the fabric up to its full height, sew right sides together, and then fold the wrong sides together. You end up with the same shape for much less headache.)

4.  Fold your red fabric in half with the selvedge running along the length, and cut a hat shape from your red fabric. The base should be the same width as your trim, and the height is roughly the height of your yardage, or whatever looks right. You can see I was just winging it here, but it only needs to sit on the head and flop over so anything pointy will work. I chose not to make a symmetrical cone in favor of maximizing the stretch of the knit. That means the hat opening runs perpendicular to the selvedge and the point runs off a little to the side (so that there is only one seam). If you are using a furry or napped fabric, as I was here, remember to run the nap in the direction you want it before cutting.

5. Fold with right sides together and stitch the cut edge closed. Pinning helps with a soft or slippery fabric. Turn right side out.

6. Cut and stitch the lining fabric the same as for the red cap. Next, with the lining wrong side out and the cap right side out, slip the cap into the lining, matching up the two seams. Right sides should be facing each other.

showing the opening on the left

pulling the hat through the opening

white lining needs to be pushed into the red cap

7. Stitch the opening of the cap closed, leaving a 2" gap to turn. Then pull the hat right side out. You'll end up with the lining opposite the cap. Just push it in, poke it gently from the inside with a knitting needle or chopstick to define the point, and iron if necessary. If you are a stickler, you can handstitch the opening closed again, but I didn't do this since it all gets caught up in the trim, anyway.

trim: folded edge is up, raw edges are down

trim inside hat, ready to be stitched

8. Attach the lining in the same way. With the hat red side out, and the trim folded side down, slip the trim into the hat and pin around the edges.

9. Now you will legitimately have 4 thicknesses of fabric to sew through. I set the machine to the maximum stitch length and lightened the pressure foot a little. And then sewed very slowly. If your foot gets caught in the fur, as mine sometimes did, just backstitch aways, smooth the fur down, and stitch forward again.

10. The raw seam will be on the outside of the hat, like so.

trim folded up to cover raw seam

11. But when you fold the trim up, it will cover the seam. Sew it closed with a simple slipstitch.

12. The pom-pom: in this wonderful age of idea sharing, I still feel strongly about attribution so want to point you to  this video where I found the ingenious way of making a pom-pom to match the brim. Just cut a circle of fabric (this shows 9", but I ended up cutting it down to 7"), take a running stitch along the perimeter, and draw it closed around the fill of your choice: chopped up fabric scraps, as shown in the video and which I used here, or (preferably) some kind of light polyfiber stuffing that you have sitting around.

13. Trim down the ends of your gathered ball, and hot glue it to the point of the cap. I actually sewed the pom-pom to the cap before gluing it, as you can see above, using the gathering thread and taking the needle down through the point of the cap and lining.

14. That's it. Here's the finished hat with the seam at the back. Now that I think about it, that shape works really well for the sloping line from forehead to back of head.

In any case, it fits C's big head and he loves it. And since he chose to remove his hair in the dead of winter, I'm doubly glad that the hat is lined and seamless.

white christmas (with quiz & lyrics)

I've mentioned previously that when I was young, the Bing Crosby movie White Christmas was broadcast every December 24th. My older sister and I watched it together every year; so much so that once we had both left home for other countries, one of the pangs I would get around Christmastime was that I couldn't watch this movie with her. No one else in the world can make me laugh simply by saying, "Mutual, I'm sure" in a nasal voice. And no one else can exclaim, "That waist!" or "That dress!" and instantly convey a history of conversation—because as predictably as a sequence of scenes, we would often have the same comments at the same points in the movie.

I have since introduced White Christmas to my own family. C got it immediately, while D and S have merely tolerated it; but everyone knows we'll be watching it come December. We have crowded friends into the living room to view it together, and we have gone to the theatre to watch it on the big screen. (If you ever get a chance to see it like that, do: there is nothing like a roomful people laughing at the same silly gags and singing White Christmas in unison. It was like sitting with my sister...times three or four hundred.)

Last year I ran the dvd with Rosemary Clooney's commentary while making Christmas dinner. That inspired me to jot down some trivia questions, which I planned to share at a White Christmas screening this year. But this cough has persisted, and I am laying low trying to shake it.

I had become resigned to shelving the quiz until Karen suggested a group viewing over twitter. This is why I like her! She chose a date and time:

Saturday, December 10th

6pm Pacific Standard Time

—and suggested we hashtag our tweets (#whitechristmas) as we watch the movie. We may be a minute or two out of sync, but it'll be close enough. For me, I'm planning to hit the "play movie" button as soon as the clock turns. Please consider joining us—the more, the merrier.

The quiz is below, and here it is in printable .pdf format, in case you want to host a White Christmas screening of your own. You could also print lyric sheets of the songs for a singalong…and drat, because I'm such a dork and found that there is no site with all the song lyrics compiled together, I've gone and done that, too—just click here.

May your days be merry and bright.

White Christmas Trivia Quiz

1. The song White Christmas originally appeared in a 1942 movie which also starred Bing Crosby. Name the film.

2. The opening bars of the song are not heard in this film. Complete the verse with five words:

The sun is shining, the grass is green,

The orange and palm trees sway.

There's never been such a day

in Beverly Hills, LA

But it's December the twenty-forth,

And I am ___ ___ ___ ___ ___

(Extra points if you can sing it!)

3. Danny Kaye was the third choice to play Phil Davis. Name one of the other two stars originally tapped for the role. 

4. White Christmas opened in 1954. Which landmark 1954 Supreme Court case ended school segregation that same year? 

5. Also in the same year, what tradition did George Balanchine begin in New York City?

6. In what year does the first scene take place?

7. What is the name of the Broadway musical that Wallace & Davis are performing in Florida?

8. Wallace & Davis meet the Haynes sisters purportedly via a letter from their army buddy Benny Haynes, "the dog-faced boy." Which former child star's photo was used for Benny?

9. One of the Haynes sisters was played by Rosemary Clooney, a singer. The other was played by Vera-Ellen, a dancer. Which famous singer dubbed Vera-Ellen's voice in the duet Sisters?

10. My sister could never get over Vera Ellen's tiny waist. How big around (in inches) was it?

11. What is the 2-word name of the fictional Vermont town to which Wallace and Davis follow the two Haynes sisters?

12. When Betty and Bob meet at the lodge late one night, what advice does Bob give her for her insomnia?

13. One of the male dancers in the film went on to win an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1961 (also a musical). Name either the actor or the film for which he won.

14. The director of White Christmas was a Hungarian-American named Michael Curtiz. Which 1942 Academy Award-winning drama did he also direct?

15. In addition to the four leads, White Christmas features several standout supporting performances. One of these is Mary Wickes' housekeeper, Emma. In the days before rotoscoping and motion capture, Wickes served as the live-action reference model for which Disney villain?

7 things

I go on a lot about twitter, but it's really expanded my life in a way I couldn't have imagined three years ago. For example, I met Stuart Dunstan through twitter. Stuart is an animator and homeschooling dad. I know him as a friendly and intelligent person, yet have no idea what he looks like—I tend to think of him as the green cyclops avatar on his blog and twitter account. 


Stuart's tapped me in a blog game to write 7 things about myself and pass the game to some other homeschooling bloggers. I see now that it has taken me nearly 6 weeks to think of those 7 simple things, so without further ado...


1. My favorite dessert is not chocolate. I would much rather have something like this:

Image via Wikipedia

2. And this is my favorite breakfast:

Image by Backpack Foodie via Flickr

extra points if you can identify it (hint: savory, not sweet)

3. Despite not being religious now, I grew up in a churchgoing family. My father was a lay minister in the Methodist church he was raised in, and we often came home from church and read more scripture aloud in the afternoon.

John Wesley (Image via Wikipedia)

4. I like to say that I am related to John Lennon, as Carrie Fisher puts it, "by scandal." According to family stories, one of my great-grandfather's girlfriend's grandchildren was May Pang, the woman who lived with Lennon during his "lost weekend" year. Whether she is a blood relation is not clear to me.

Image via Wikipedia

5. I have a huge pet peeve about parking and traffic tickets. It's something that can send me on an instant rant.

Image via Wikipedia

6. However, I don't mind spiders and spiderwebs so you may find them in the corners of our house.

7. I have been known to enlist the services of psychics, seers and communicators from time to time and find them helpful.

Now, I'll pass this on to:


Elizabeth at Sattvic Family


Jen at Home With Heart


Karen at One More Tyme


Lisa at Lisa Nalbone


Sam at Ninth Street East