Making Christmas Gifts

These past few days I have been working on making a hat that was requested by my niece.  She wanted me to knit her a hat with ear flaps and add the cat ears on top.  Admittedly I am not the greatest knitter, but I could not tell her "no" without giving it a go first. I made no promises one way or the other and after the Thanksgiving craze died down, I immediately began my search for a pattern to use.  In hindsight I should have searched for a pattern that had all of the elements that I needed, but was unaware that these hats were popular with some of the younger crowd this year.  I was fortunate enough to find a free pattern for an ear flap hat (http://heyjulie.wordpress.com/2006/06/27/basic-earflap-hat/)and then later found a pattern for the ear flap hat with cat ears (http://www.kittyville.com/knit/kitty_hat.html)and used just the cat ear portion of that pattern. I rushed to get the yarn and needles that I needed for the project and started my knitting adventure.   I played with the ears a bit and made them where they can curl up a bit.  Needless to say, I am pretty pleased with the results.

I will apologize for my poor modeling skills.  I had my hubby take the picture and this was like take 20.  Who knew he would make snapping a pic so diffucult! :) Despite the adventures in picture taking, I would have to say that the most difficult part of this project was getting the ears on evenly.  Looking back, I am glad I tried something that was new to me and I can't wait to surprise my niece with it as part of her Christmas!