1955 Ear Cover

My younger sister asked if I could find a knitting pattern for the kind of hat she wore as a child. I found the pattern our mom used in this booklet

 but it was a pattern for a child, so here’s an updated, slightly enlarged version.

Acquire a skein of yarn. One skein of any weight will usually make one hat. Sport, DK, Worsted, Bulky, whatever you've got that you're willing to put on your head.

I used Knit Picks Stroll fingering weight  because I wanted to make it double-thick,  in color Cocoa, because what could be warmer?

Acquire knitting needles in the mid-range of what the yarn label recommends.

I used a US 2 because the yarn label recommended sizes 1-3.

You can use straight needles, but circulars or dpns will be useful for some parts.

I used dpns and a pair of circulars.

The hat starts and ends with Icord. This is the main place where dpns are your friend.
Cast on 3 sts, using any method you like.
K 3 sts, slide to the other end of the needle (or slip back onto the 1st straight needle), and K the 3 sts again. Keep doing that until you have 13” of Icord.

It took me 100 rows.

Increase by knitting into the front and back (KFB) of each st. (Total: 6 sts)

At this point I slid every other st onto another needle and knit in rds, and started the next rd by bringing the yarn between the two needles, as if doing one more rd of Icord.

 

K one row.
KFB, k to last st, KFB.

I did a set of increases on each of the two needles.

 

Repeat those two rows until hat is 4” across.

For me that was 29 sts.

Continue on those sts in stockinette until center section is 12” long. To keep the ends from curling, work the first and last 3 sts of each row in garter stitch (knit every row) or seed stitch (p1, k1, p1 on Right Side, K1, p1, k1 on Wrong Side).
It took me 128 rows, more or less. If you're making it double thickness you don't have to worry about the sides curling.

SSK, knit to last 2 sts, K2TOG.
K one row.
Repeat those two rows until 6 sts remain. 
Again, I worked the decreases on each of my two needles.
SSK 3 times.
I knit a st from the front needle together with a st from the back needle so that I was back on one needle.

Make another 13” of Icord.
Bind off, any way you like.
Run the ends carefully up inside the Icord for a few inches to hide, and snip off the extra.