So last night I FINALLY figured out how to finish the Pi Topper Chemo Cap. I made this for my aunt, who has breast cancer, and is a few weeks into her chemo treatments and has already shaved her head. I made the hat out of Malabrigo Silky Merino, which is soooo nice to knit with! For anyone who is making this or is planning to make this, don't be afraid of the band directions! First of all, when you make the band, you're just going around in garter stitch and picking up live stitches from the bottom of the hat. But what I couldn't find any directions on was how to join the edges of the band. I sat there for a whole night with the hat in one hand and the directions in the other and could NOT figure it out. Finally, last night, I did! When you have one end on one needle and the other end is flapping in the breeze, you are going to take your right needle (with the stitches on it) and pick up stitches from the loose end, so its kind of like you are knitting two together, then wrap the yarn from the right needle to knit, and voila! The ends of the band will be joined. I'm going to do this and take pics while I'm doing it, but that's the general gist of it. Then instead of having 14 sts, you will have 28 sts, just k2tog every time and you'll be back to where you need to be. Again, I need to add pics. Go to the site with the pattern to see what the hat is SUPPOSED to look like.

So! After I finished I decided to go to bed and block this baby this morning. Last week I bought a styrofoam head at a beauty supply store for just this occasion. I dunked, rinsed, rinsed again, and was ready to put on the scary head for the day. Except when I put it on the scary head (I think the head's name is Helen, by the way), it looked like this!

It didn't look like that while I was knitting it! I left it on Helen last night before I went to bed and it looked just fine! I was on the verge of a meltdown when I realized... Helen is maybe smaller than the average adult head. So I took a measurement of my head versus Helen. I had to get the look and angle to be the same, and as you can see, I was right:

1. Helen IS scary, and normal people do not tilt their heads and close their eyes all the time like that.

2. Helen is really a few inches smaller than my head, which is a pretty normal sized adult human head. I'm going to need a bigger Helen. But, I'll keep this one for kids hats, I think.

But... the hat still looks huge. Was I not supposed to block the Silky Merino? I will be devastated if I have to start over with a whole new hat! I was trying to think of what to do, when I remembered that I read somewhere on Ravelry that someone used a plate to block this hat. Aha! So I took out one of my salad plates and stuck it into the hat, and then put the hat AND plate on top of Helen, who I hate right now. I left it all in the bathroom (with the door CLOSED so my two wonderful cats don't invade and interrupt the process) and it looks like this:

By the way, that flap that just looks messy is really going to be sewed onto the band with a beautiful button, so it looks like... a flap with a button.

Can someone please reassure me that this hat is going to be ok? As you can see, it is down to Helen's NOSE, and looks ridiculous. I don't want my aunt to look like that kid from Fat Albert when she wears it. Now I'm wondering if gravity is going to take over and pull it down even farther? Can I block it again? Should I just give up and start again? Help!!!