KNITTER’S NOTEBOOK: WARM HATS AND GOOD FRIENDS Read more about Ed’s hat at Modern Daily Knitting.
Ed’ Hat: Form, Function and Ultimate Winter Warmth
It was October when we met Jeannie and Ed. We had recently moved back to Iowa City, Iowa, after 16 years in Minnesota. My husband, Rody and I were settling into our new life, our new neighborhood, and our new house. Our three children, two of them teenagers, were adjusting to their new schools.
Sometime after school had started in mid-august, our youngest daughter Lelia and her classmates were tested by the school’s band director for the appropriate musical instrument. They had played their instruments for a mere 6 weeks and now they were having their first concert. Attending this concert could only be described as an expression of faith. And love. In the audience were parents and siblings and a few grandparents. Relatives.
The 6th graders had been playing a year. They came after the 5th graders. There was an intermission sandwiched in between the two groups to give the bands time to trade places. That’s when Jeannie and Ed introduced themselves.
“We’re your neighbors,” Jeannie told us. “We live near the end of the block. Lelia invited us. And we try to never refuse an invitation to see a concert at Opstad.” Opstad, the neighborhood high school’s auditorium is a source of great civic pride. It had just been renovated and restored to its original grandeur.
I understood the civic pride part. But a fifth-grade concert? Well, that was a gigantic demonstration of neighborliness that touched both my husband and me. And it marked the beginning of our friendship. Since then, Jeannie and Ed have attended many more of our families’ events: graduation and birthday parties, band concerts, and even a bat mitzvah. They’ve helped us in times of need and we have tried to do the same. They’ve taught us much about what it means to be a good neighbors. So, when Ed called me last week in the middle of the coldest winter that this prairie town has experienced in years and asked if I might be able to knit him a hat that was warm and covered his ears, well, I was ready to get work and make him the best defense against arctic weather hat.
I knew the perfect pattern. Simple, fast and sure to keep Ed’s ears snug and cozy even on the very coldest of days. I’ve had made many of these hats over the years. And in celebration of good friends and neighbors everywhere, I’d like to share this pattern with you.