sis's chemo hat collection part 1

Sis's chemo hat collection, part 1.  Yup, I'm going to explore the wonderful world of chemo hats for bowling ball heads.  Our heads are round with short necks and most hats just don't fit well.  Without hair, hats fit even worse.  We are constantly pulling on them trying to get them to stay on.  I'm still looking for a style that really works.

First up, we looked at making fleece hats using McCall's M4681 hat, scarf, and mitten pattern.  We used view D without the flower trim.  She just wanted a plain hat, no trims, no gathers on top, no dangly bits.  The hat is of a very simple construction a back seam, a seam across the top and a hem.  The problem is, it's a tube.  We don't have the elongated skull or neck to pull off wearing a tube.  So I added gathers between the center-front seam and the hem to pull the bottom of the hem up off our noses.

It helped; but she discovered that the hat fit better if she turned it around and wore the gathered part in the back.  The biggest issue is the hat quickly got too hot to wear.  Fleece while soft doesn't work if your chemo makes you feel hot.

This is four of the six hats I made.  The other two were a green/black/white plaid and a Black Watch type plaid of navy/black/forest green.

While I was playing with the fleece Sis wanted me to make face-masks to pre-warm the air before it hit her sinus and lungs.  I found this pattern Germ Free Face Mask over at MammaCanDoIt.com.  A single layer of fleece isn't thick enough for pre-warming your breath.  So I added a second layer, that was better but still not good enough.  I wonder if adding a piece of woven cotton would have helped.  I think a molded wire or piece of metal to pinch it tightly around the nose would have helped, too.  I ran out of cold weather and ideas for materials to shape the nose so I dropped that project for now.

Lunch is calling me, so I hope everyone is having a good day!

Judy