This year, I decided to save some money by crocheting as many gifts as possible, mostly hats. Now adults may appreciate it, but kids (specifically in the 2-9 group like my nieces and nephews) you have to work to get excited over it. Enter Ravelry pattern search! (One of my favorite sites, check them out here: http://www.ravelry.com/ )
It all started when I stumbled on a pattern for a Batman logo. My 9 yr old nephew LOVES Batman. Then I found a neat pattern for a Superman symbol (favorite of his dad) and thus, the superhero Christmas was born. A few weeks later, I had a plan, and the best part was, I already had most of the materials needed in my stash! Here is what I came up with:
Spiderman was by far the hardest. I searched and searched for a pattern, but the few I found didn't appeal to me. I couldn't disappoint the 8 yr old Spidey fan in my life, so I got creative. In the end, I crocheted a red earflap hat with a blue border and hand stitched the webbing on (not a fun task). Finished it off with a set of eyes I designed myself, and viola!
Pattern for the eyes can be found on my blog: http://stitchingupsarah.blogspot.com/2013/12/spidey-eyes.html
Next it was on to the one that inspired it all... Batman. Found an awesome logo pattern and sewed it onto a black earflap.
Pattern for the logo here: http://www.louiesloops.com/2012/07/holy-free-pattern-batman.html
Now the two year old isn't really old enough to know the superheros and have a favorite yet. He calls Superman "Man man" but that's about it. So for this one, I got to play around and pick one that I wanted to do. A red earflap hat and yet another awesome logo later... The Flash hat was born.
Pattern for the logo here: http://crafterchick.com/the-flash-superhero-beanie-hat-crochet-pattern/
And finally it was time for the father of the little clan. My sister's fiance is a huge Superman fan, so the choice was easy. Luckily I stumbled upon a pretty easy pattern for the logo too. One blue earflap later, I had another hero down.
Pattern for the logo here: http://angie8686.blogspot.com/2013/08/superman-emblem-applique.html
In the end, the boys loved them! Even the two year old, who usually hates hats, put his on right away and danced around in it. I saved money by not buying tons of noisy toys to drive mommy crazy, but they still got their favorite heroes. Bonus: they have hats that they will wear voluntarily! No more morning wars over keeping warm. Everybody wins.
