“Vivacious Butterfly” is a an elegant, brimmed sunhat made using easy stitches so crocheters of all skill levels can make it.

This informal bucket hat is perfect for resort wear or for an outing to the beach. Use it as a sun hat to protect your pretty noggin from the heat of the sun or along with any casual wear.

I used really simple stitches to make the hat, just the use of different colors make the hat colors pop.

Skill Level:
Easy

Materials:

Suggested Yarns:
You will need approximately 190- 200 yards of any worsted weight yarn for making this hat.

I Used:
Designs By Mamta Paper Raffia (100% Cellulose; 30 yds28 m/1.25 oz 30 g; CYCA # 4): #Red, #Blue, #Green, #Light Red, #Orange #Yellow, 1 skein each.

Designs By Mamta American Oak (100% Oak Fiber; 50 yds46 m/1.76 oz 50 g; CYCA # 4): #Natural, 1 skein.

Crochet Hook Size:
5mm/ H-8 crochet hook or size needed to obtain gauge.

Notions:
Stitch Marker(S)

A little bit of the back story of this hat:

It took me 6 days to make this hat. I am super fast at crochet. But when I had learnt it some 32 years back, my focus was speed and perfection. Now, that I’ve grown with crocheting, I enjoy the process of crocheting at a slow and steady pace. My focus is still perfection. That hasn’t changed a bit. Yay to perfection!

I go out a lot into the sun. My natural hair is jet black, but I bleached it to a golden color a short while ago. Earlier it was ok when I had black hair, but bleached hair and sun don’t make a good combination. Plus, I get huge headache if I’m too much in the sun. So I decided to make myself a hat to protect my noggin.

You won’t believe it if I said this hat is made with paper and oak raffia. Yes, I totally made it using only natural materials. This is the first time, I’ve used American oak raffia.

I first used paper raffia in 1999-2000 when paper raffia was in huge fashion in India. With this material, I designed a bag for a fashion designing professor at JD Institute of Fashion Designing in Mumbai. Then, I designed a similar hat for an ultra modern girl in my neighborhood. Then, I designed another crochet bag for one of my UK customer.

I bought the American Oak Raffia fiber from Etsy and it came from US. I then handspun a yarn out of that fiber.

Strange, how things begin its journey in one place and end up on a completely opposite end of the globe. Who knew this fiber will be used by me to make yarn and then I will crochet a hat for me right here in Mumbai some day.

I had originally thought to make the hat with just 3 colors of paper raffia: red, blue and green. I thought the 3 colors I was using will be enough. But I fell short of yarn, I didn’t want to buy yarn as I’ve decided to use all my existing yarns first. That’s one of my goals. You know why I want to use all my yarns? So I can buy more yarn later, haha.

So then, I used some more paper raffia that I had bought locally. But I fell short of yarn again. I scratched my head to remember what I could use to finish this hat.

I thought to use one of my handspun yarns from the wild fibers that I have begun gathering recently. I remembered that I had oak raffia fiber somewhere in my stash which would be perfect to use. But it was not easy to find as it was stuck somewhere in my stash.

Thankfully, I remember the finer details of things easily. My mind is like a library. If someone has told me anything, it remains in my mind for ages till I want to forget it - it can be a good or a bad thing. So I remembered the exact area where my oak fiber was but not the exact location. I searched and searched for the raffia in all my boxes and finally found it.

Raffia, natural fibers and stiff yarns are not so easy to crochet with. When I began crocheting on a large scale for export orders in 1999-2000, I had to work a lot with stiff yarns.

Imagine making 3-4 medium sized bags in a day or an entire adult sized crochet top with lace weight thread within a day. Yeah, I was that fast and no, it was not those loose kind of crochet either that you see being sold commercially too.

My crochet tension is not too tight and not too loose, it is just the right tension. I even used to get compliments from the exporter who used to give me export crochet orders to make those bags. She used to say that she loved my handiwork and my work had clean lines.

I remember, I had hurt my hands in the process once and ended up with swollen hands, especially my right hand as I crochet with my right hand. I know that if I would have worked faster with such stiffer yarns, I would have ended with swollen hands.

So when I was working with raffia this time, I went easy on my hands and made the hat at a very slow pace over a period of a few days. Well, not in the end when I worked with the oak raffia as I was getting really excited to finish making it.

Out of paper raffia and oak raffia, the oak one was more stiffer and a bit difficult to crochet with. However, thankfully, my hands are doing fine.

If you are going to work with raffia or any stiffer yarns to make this hat like I did, please be careful and don’t hurt your hands in the process.

You may use a stiff yarn like paper raffia, plarn, T-Shirt yarn or cotton cording to bring out the stiffer effect in this hat. However, you may also use any softer yarns and then make it stiff after it is crocheted.

Why the name, “Vivacious Butterfly”? I used to work for Delta Airlines. During my training, we played a game where each of us trainees were asked to describe ourselves. This was my reply. I’m really like that, a colorful, vivacious butterfly.

This rainbow hat totally suits my colorful personality. When I saw my finished hat, this name just popped in my head and here you have it, a “Vivacious Butterfly” ready to fly away on your head.

©Vivacious Butterfly by Mamta Motiyani 2022. All Rights Reserved.