Easy French Knit Earmuff Headband

I've been thinking of making my own earmuff headband for a while, but wasn't sure how to approach it. Recenlty, I made a French Knitter, and then made an Instructable on how to use one. I had to knit a cord to show how to use it, so then I just had this cord made out of a soft yarn just sitting here. I was playing with it and thought about coiling it up into a bun and realized the length I had was perfect for covering my ears. So, I decided to make coiled bun earmuff headband.

Considering I just made it up as I went, I'm happy with how it turned out :)

All pictures of me wearing the headband were taken by the amazingly talented photographer audreyobscura .

You don't need too many supplies for this, just time really.

Supplies:

• Yarn*
• French Knitter - or make your own !
• Crochet Hook (optional)
• Scissors
• Safety Pins (not pictured - didn't know I'd be using them when I took this picture)
• Yarn Needle

*I would suggest a soft yarn if possible. The type I used isn't available anymore (Loops & Threads Silky Soft), just in case people were wondering.

We are going to start with the tube spirals that will cover your ears.

I used my French knitter with the 6 prong attachment and knit until I had a tube that was about 29 inches long. I would say to coil it up once in a while and see what it is big enough for you. Keep in mind that you will be essentially adding another coil width to each side when you put the headband together so you can make it a tidge smaller than you want it.

When you are done, take the tube off the knitter. I would suggest leaving a long tail. You are going to use it to sew the coil up and you can use it to help sew the headband together at the end. I find it easier to work with yarn that is already attached then try to attach more yarn later to sew.

Okay, once you have your tubes, you need to sew them up into your little coils or buns.

I tried to show with the pictures, but what you want to do is sew it up and try not to have your sewing yarn show at all if possible.

I would sew from one side to the other and try to bring the yarn along inside the bun. You want to make sure you are sewing at least 2 stitches in the bun. If you only do one, you are going to pull that stitch loose. I probably wouldn't do more than 2 stitches either as you don't want big gaps in your bun.

Also, make sure you only go through one side of the tube, if you go through both, you'll squish the tube down.

My buns ended up being about 3.5" across.

Knit the tube that will be your headband. There isn't really a best way to do it, but I just would wrap it around my head like the headband as I knit until it was about the length I wanted. You can make it a tad shorter than would wrap twice, as you want it to be a little smaller so it grips your head and doesn't just slide right off.

When I measured twice around my head with a measuring tape, I came up with about 46". And I ended up knitting a cord that was about 42". So, you can use that as a guide, or just go for it.

So, this went through many versions in my head while I was knitting my cord, but I finally came up with a way to attach everything together that made me happy. I'm not 100% happy with it, but it works well.

It's kind of hard to explain, but I'll try, follow along with the images to help it make sense. I did that crummy illustration* to give you an idea of how everything is going to go together.

Lengths: The strip that goes from the top of the bun, over the forhead, and to the top of the other bun measures, for me, about 9 inches. And the strip that goes from the bottom of the bun, down around the base of the head, to the bottom of the other bun measures about 3 inches. So the strip around the front of the head will probably be about 3x the size of the bottom.

Essentially, the headband cord is going to be doubled over, and the tubes are going to hug the buns. Originally I was going to sew the whole headband to itself, but I was worried that sewing the strips and top and at the base of my head would get in the way of its stretchiness. So I just sewed it so the ends were connected and so the tubes were connected to the buns.

I used safety pins to put things in place. I tried it on, carefully, to make sure it would fit right. Remember, you want it to be the slightest bit tight on your head so it stays in place. A perfect fit may just slip off your head.

Look at image notes to help it all make sense.

*Another option is to wrap the middle of your headband cord around one of the buns, and then have the ends meet at the other end, as show in the second image.

I'm breaking up the steps for putting together the headband because I have lots of pictures to try to show what I am doing and I don't want to have like 25 pictures in one step.

Before you start sewing on the bun, it can help to put more safety pins on to hold the tube in place; this can be particularly helpful if you are stretching your tube around the bun. You want it sewn as evenly as possible so you want to prestretch it around.

I started by sewing those two ends down on the bottom. Once they were in place, I started to sew around the bun. When I got to the top of the bun, I carefully sewed together where the two tubes meet and where those tubes meet the bun. You want to really sew it all here because you don't want any of this to pull away or come undone.

Continue sewing around the bun until you get back to where you started.

Since I still had yarn, I decided to sew the other end of the headband on and get that done.

I just sewed that together the best I could to make the hold strong, while also trying to make it so the stitches weren't too obvious or noticeable.

Time to attach the other bun. If you left a long piece of yarn off your bun, use that to sew it on. I didn't because I didn't know what I was going to do at the tie, so I tied on a new piece and just hid the extra end later.

Sew around the bun making sure to really sew the points at the top and bottom where the two pieces of the tube meet the bun.

The second image shows where I safety pinned to hold the tube against the bun so I could sew evenly around the bun.

If you have any stray yarns, hide them now and you'll be done! I always just sew them into the closest tube and then cut off any excess. Tie a small knot if necessary to make sure things don't come undone.

All the way around, my headband measures about 25 inches. If I made this again, I'd try to make it a little shorter so it fit my head a little snugger, but make yours however you want it.

Need a scarf to go with it? Try out my Knit Infinity Tube Scarf .