NPS Hats: Great Sand Dunes Casting on

 

Next National Parks hat project list is the Great Sand Dunes in Colorado. We will be camping there next month I am looking forward to seeing this finished hat compared to what we will be seeing there. 

There weren’t any kits available for this hat when I ordered the Big Bend and Black Canyon of the Gunnison kits. Finding the six colors of yarns needed for this pattern was a challenge for sure! I did buy the Malabrigo Rios Fog yarn because I needed to buy the two colors of Malabrigo Rios yarn for the Mesa Verde hat. 

Unfortunately getting the Stunning String Studio Legacy Bohemia color was exceedingly difficult. I could not find that color at all on their website or several others sites. I think maybe they stopped making the color all together? Next I decided that for the Malabrigo Rios in Ivy, I didn't need to buy a whole skein of green yarn since that is a color I buy often. Peekaboo Yarns I was able to find but at $27 a skein I didn't want to pay that much to only use 20 yards of yarn. I'm not familiar with that yarn and I don't like buying a whole skein plus shipping for a small need without knowing the yarn. 

The buying yarn option for this hat's dealbreaker was the Bohemia color. Finding a yarn that was close to the Bohemia color was really tricky. I couldn't spend too much more time web searching for yarn so I decided that I should seek options in my stash. I began to focus my search to find the appropriate color over weight. I stayed in the worsted and DK range as limiting factors. My preference was superwash wool and no acrylic, wool only. After spending a few hours searching through my list online and from memory I was able to find the colors needed. Turns out I've got a near equivalent yarn in my stash. 

Here’s what I chose

Yarn A: Madeline Tosh Vintage Filigree

Yarn B: Madeline Tosh Vintage Laurel and Ella Rae lace worsted Emerald

Yarn C: Madeline Tosh Vintage Nikko Blue

Yarn D: Malabrigo Rios Fog

Yarn E: Madeline Tosh Merino Smokestack 

Yarn F: Plymouth Baby Alpaca worsted Sky

I cast on with the Madeline Tosh Vintage in Filigree for the Stunning String Studio Legacy in Bohemia. I will use the yarns listed above to follow the pattern. I hope to have enough green to work with which is why I have two colors listed. I will likely rotate rounds with each to help it blend more. MTV is my preference as its color is the most similar to the Ivy suggested in the pattern.