An Epic Stocking Cap: Humble Beginnings

I've known my friend Chad for as long as I can remember. Literally. He's two years younger than me, and three grades behind. We bonded over theatre and our mutual misery backstage in middle school. While I got out of the theatre circuit, Chad's still involved. So when he asked me to make him a stocking cap almost five feet long for his Christmas show and his role as the evil elf, how could I say no?

We went and he picked out some lovely jewel-toned yarn, and I searched in vain for a pattern that would serve the purpose. I finally settled on the Nauti-Knitter's Randy Hat (http://nautiknitter.wordpress.com/2008/02/12/randys-stocking-cap-pattern/).

I began what is sure to be an epic journey today in between readings for various classes. The stretchy opening proved to be the most time-consuming part--I have a personal vendetta against rib stitching for exactly this reason. It does look really cool though. I made tremendous progress yesterday, completing about 35 rows. Just for reference, there's approximately 320 rows in this hat. That's over 10%! Lol, it isn't really that much, but again now that I've got the stretchy part (I feel weird calling it the "brim", but that is my first inclination) done it should progress much faster. Chad asked me to keep him apprised of my progress every step of the way, so I took photos as I went and will continue to do so. Here's the photos from today.

The second stripe: it starts

Third stripe!

Time for bed, but you can see the fourth stripe's infancy.

That's where I'm at so far. I'm hoping to get some more done tomorrow, though I do have to catch up with some additional schoolwork. We shall see.

More musings to follow, I'm sure, as the hat progresses.