Beard for the beanie!

I have recently had a lot of requests about making a beard beanie. No one has a (good) free pattern on this, that I have found anyway. Most of them were kind of plain looking instead of beard-y looking! So, I decided to make one of my own!

(Preliminary product, see below for finished)

This is the first step. I made the beard using the "Astrakhan Stitch", which I picked out from the "Crochet Stitches" book on page 186. Unlike other stitches, you do not turn the work after every row. I used a yarn that had a bulk of 5, it was really soft and I just liked the color. The yarn I used is De Aire Plymouth, which is a 100% fine merino wool. I used maybe about half a hank or maybe 3/5 (the hank I got came in approx. 109 yards).

The stitch is as follows (although I recommend you get the book, it has a bunch of good stuff in there!):

• Foundation chain. Chain as many as you need, and then chain 2 more. (You will want to measure the length of the jaw, going just below the ear lobe. I put maybe 6 too many chains on each side because it didn't occur to me that it would overlap with the edge of the hat. So keep that in mind when you are deciding how long to make it.)
• Foundation row. DC into the 4th chain from the hook, and DC all the way to the end. Don't turn!
• Row 1. Working from left to right, sk first DC, *ch 7, sl st into next DC to the right of the one you skipped. Repeat from * to the end, sl st into the 3rd stitch of the chains you'd made at the beginning of the DC row. (I know that's a little confusing but it'll make a little sense when you do it. It would be into the "dc in the 4th chain" area that you'd worked.) Don't turn!
• Row 2. Working from right to left go behind the loops of row 1 and hook into the back loops only. Ch 3, sk first st, DC into the back loops as described all the way across to end. Don't turn!
• Row 3. Repeat 1 and 2 until you get the desired width of the beard. I did 4 rows of looped stitches and did not finish with the DC row--just ended it at the end of the loopy-stitch row.

I used an H hook for the beard. After that, I made the mustache with an F hook. The pattern I used was a free one on Ravelry that was a "handlebar mustache" style. I just stitched that in, bringing it in closer around the mouth. (So you can see the difference between this picture/the final product and the one above.) And this is what it turned out like:

The pattern for the mustache can be found at http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/handlebar-moustache.

Here's a picture of what the yarn looks like. I used the charcoal color. Very nice to work with, and you can work it up quickly. You can see the strands are kinda "braided". It's pretty thick but I thought it would be nice for the Montana winters!

I had grand ideas of attaching the beard to the hat with a button, so that no one had to deal with a string around their head or ears. After a couple trials, I gave up on that idea, and decided simply to deal with a string around the ears.

These are the hats that I made for one of my friends, who wanted two beard beanies. They are both 22 1/2" hats (Size 7 1/8) made using a thin wool blend on the green one and an acrylic on the orange. I'd like to try a bulkier yarn and see what it looks like with the beard. I'm sure it'd be more woodsman-y!

The pattern for the orange one, which has a "vented" like top (so probably wouldn't be good for real cold weather?? I don't know??) is as follows:

• Foundation. ch 46 (or however many it takes to fit around your head)
• Row 1. sc in each
• Row 2-80. working in back loops only (blo), do 80 rows of this (or however long you want to make this... mine was 80 and I probably would go even longer!!)
• Seam. sl st up the side to make a tube
• Top Row 1. 3sctog around, skipping 1 stitch in between til you get back to the start/the seam
• Top Row 2. 3sctog, don't skip a stitch
• Top Row 3. 2sctog to close

This is a modification of the "Team Spirit Hat" that is found here: http://crochet.about.com/od/hats/a/Team_Spirit_Hat.htm . I made the green one like this but I wasn't real sure about how she chose to do the top. (She ties off at the seam, then stitches a circle, and then attaches the circle to the top of the hat. The stitching came out a little bunchy for me and it took me a while to fix the "lumps".)

I think my orange hat would work with a pom-pom on the top. I would like to try that some time too.

Here the orange one is completed:

I also tried the Astrakhan by modifying it where I did 3 loops instead of 7, given the thinner yarn that I used on this picture below. So play with it a little, depending on what kind of yarn you pick! :)

I used an F hook on the beard, and I think I went up to a G on the mustache with a double-strand (otherwise it would have been very small and this is for a grown man).

The hat is the "Seaman's Cap" I found on Ravelry as well. Another free pattern! :)