February socks

Because February is all about perseverance.


Pattern: Conwy socks, from Knitting on the Road
Heel: Round heel, slip-stitch heel flap
Toe: Star
Yarn: Knitpicks Gloss in Dusk, a present from Laura. 1 1/3 skeins
Needles: Brittany birch 2.75 mm dpns, from I Knit London
Gauge: 16 st x 24 r = 5 cm in stocking stitch
Via the Workbasket? Oh yes

I really enjoyed knitting with this yarn, and it is a pleasure to wear. It is strong and soft and shiny and fluffy all at once, and socks knit from it are both snuggly and firm. Just right. They were already fuzzing a bit by around the cuff by the time I'd knit to the toe, but I am going to wear them and wear them until I wear them out, because they feel lovely. I didn't enjoy knitting the pattern as much as I'd hoped, but the final socks fit me perfectly, and I'm still really looking forward to going to Conwy itself one day, and knitting another pair!

The chart for the calf shaping kind of abandons you for the last two decrease rows. I stuck as closely to the chart as I could, just changing the last two k2togs to p2tog and the ssk to ssp to keep the ribbing intact - leaving a V-shape of disintegrating ribs down the back, which isn't very handsome. For alternative, prettier versions, see Ashley's and Amy's.

I am pleased to have these out of the Basket and on my feet. Thank you, Laura, for the wherewithal to make a pair of cosseting socks. It is much appreciated, and this week, needed indeed.

Severn Socks

I have been taking off my boots all day because I can't stop showing off my new socks!


Pattern: Charade, by Sandra Park
Heel: Slip-stitch heel flap
Toe: Wide
Yarn: Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, 045 'Cranberry', from Get Knitted. 2 skeins with lots left over
Via the stash? Definitely. I bought this last Christmas to knit some socks for my uncle, changed my mind and bought some yarn I thought was grey but turned out to be brown, and then didn't knit him any socks at all
Needles: 2.75 mm Brittany birch DPNs, from I Knit London
Gauge: 16 st x 23 rnds = 5cm


There are a few mistakes in these, which I'm quite proud of. Proud that I managed to let them go, and keep knitting. Proud that I didn't abandon the socks to the same forlorn fate as the other imperfect projects in the Workbasket just because of the odd misplaced stitch. Proud that I love them nonetheless, and perhaps because of their little idiosyncracies. Once or twice I didn't pick up stitches perfectly in pattern, and as you can see on the right foot in the picture above, one of the toe decreases is in the wrong place. The stitch markers popped off at various points and I thought I could sail through by counting. I couldn't.

I finished these in November - after struggling a bit with the grafting and giving the socks little ears a few times! - but didn't want to wear them until I'd taken some pictures. (Already, after a day of admittedly a fair amount of walking, they are pilling a bit around the heel; is this normal for Shepherd Sock or did I knit them too loosely?). Finally this weekend I managed to collect Deri, the socks and his camera all in the same place and take a few pictures (my poor little camera is going the way of all electronic goods). I am so proud of my first socks, they are so comfy and keep my feet so warm! I want to cast all my other projects aside and knit socks, socks, nothing but socks - all for meeeeeeeeeeee!

Ahem. Luckily there are a few socks in the Work Basket.

I love this pattern. Love it. I loved knitting it, I love the finished socks. Thank you, Sandra!

Socks that Block

But how?


I was up at 5.20 to go rowing this morning, and finished the toe decreases on the train, which made the fact that it was still dark somewhat bearable, and prompted conversations with random strangers (a very grumpy man on his way to a stag weekend, a sweet lady who took one look at me knitting and whipped out the blanket she was crocheting for her bed). I'm now going to have something to eat and go back to bed, and graft my first toes when I get up.

I'm a bit confused as to how to block these, though. I've seen these and even a tutorial on how to make your own, and remember reading in a Knitting Daily newsletter that Ann Budd pins her socks to blocking boards hanging on her office wall (how cool is that?). Can I just pin mine to a towel laid flat in the same way I block everything else?

Hope you get to spend a little time near some water this weekend.

On why trying to correct your mistakes can be a mistake

Towards the end of a day to end all days, I wondered whether the two SSK I had knit instead of the k2tog along one side of the gusset of my charade sock bothered me that much. I decided that since I really really love this sock, and since this was going to be The Sock That I Finished, my First Pair of socks, and all those other noble ambitions with which I had imbued each stitch, that they did. I wanted this sock to be perfect, so I'd just tink back four rows, reknit them, and sail merrily into the foot with an awesomely neat little line of decreases to frame my first* short row heel.

The problem was, due to a full-on no-good bad day, I attempted this in the pub with a comforting pint of Doom Bar on hand. The pub was quite dark. The Doom Bar was very good. The knots that hold my skeleton in place relaxed sufficiently for me to lift my head and unclench my jaw a bit. I began to concentrate more on my companion than on the sock. I then realised that I had dropped one of those YOs, and that fixing them last time had elicited the suggestion that knitting might be a bit antisocial. Since I had only just begun uttering complete sentences rather than monosyllabic snarls, I decided instead to unknit a few rows, since in theory I can do this and talk at the same time. I noticed that the unknitting had created two more dropped YOs.

I came home, I unknit a few more rows, I cried (this was at the end of One of Those Days, remember). I ripped back to before the heel flap, realised that I would never ever be able to pick up those pesky dropped YOs in a remotely sensible way, cried some more and left the sock sitting on the floor.

Help.


The irony of the fact that one of those noble sentiments was to worry less and knit more, accept my mistakes and stop letting my inner perfectionist rampage over everything else, is not lost on me.


*Sock Incomplete I at this point still being known by its childhood name, Prototype.

In which I learn about sock knitting from my dear internet friends

Thank you so much for your comments on my last post. I was overjoyed to read them not only because of what you said, although of course that too, but because you said it. I have no idea how anyone manages, or bothers, to read this blog when I post so infrequently and even more rarely about knitting, but thank you, thank you for doing so. On the subject of comments, I'd really like to be able to reply to all of them. I have made such good friends through conversations begun with the response to a comment, and, as you know, Blogger doesn't make this so easy. Hannah, if you'd send me an email (address in the sidebar) I'd love to be able to get to know you a little. I can't say I'm much better at emailing than posting, but it would be nice to think it wasn't all one way. Only if you want to, of course.

Right, on with the story of the sock. I took some more photos because I found the memory stick and then left it in London again when I returned to Casa Mum'n'Dad. French photos tomorrow, because Deri is coming to visit later! (And bringing his computer, and my camera, which I left in the glove compartment of his car).

The pattern is Charade, and I should begin by saying that I love it. The herringbone rib is truthfully addictive, and it's simple enough to knit whilst map-reading but sufficiently interesting to make even waiting for a ferry a pleasure. It did take me a while to work out how to pick up a dropped stitch (I kept dropping the last YO off the end of the needle, and then could not for a while work out how to pick it up in pattern) which tempted D to venture, after I told him that he should go to the loo since we would be landing soon and he pointed out that he had just been and I hadn't even noticed, that knitting is 'a bit antisocial'. 'Nonsense!' I cried. 'It stopped me from getting bored in the car, and I navigated the way here successfully, and you didn't want to hit me over the head with the map because I was whining like a five-year-old, and it produced you a lovely scarf which you brought all the way to France even though it was sometimes too hot for your little Celtic self to step outside!' to which he meekly replied that he would never have wanted to hit me over the head anyway and left it at that. Antisocial, huh.

So, the sock. I begin as any knitter should, and dutifully swatch. Since I can't decide which one looks like the best tension for a hand-knit sock, never having seen one before (in the thread, as it were), I consult the oracle by way of the gauge specified for Roza's Socks, which are knitted in Lorna's Laces, the yarn I'm using for Charade. So far, so good enough for Grumpy.

I read the pattern and decide to decrease the number of stitches since this is written for a 'medium' woman's foot and mine are usually considered small. Measure my foot to check, and find that mine measures 8" around the ball of the foot, while the pattern says 6.5". This cannot be! Measure D's foot to check. His is 9" around the ball of the foot, even though he takes shoes eight sizes bigger than mine. Measure again. Spend a while wondering whether I have troll feet.

Decide to consult another oracle. She says 'Multiply the inch measurement you have taken for the widest part of your leg by your gauge and then deduct twenty-five to thirty percent of that number ... This percentage reduction is necessary to make the stocking tighter than your actual leg measurement at the top ... You don't want your socks to fall down!'. To decrease by 30% would leave me with 56 sts, by 25 % with 60 (the pattern is written for 64 sts). Feel vindicated in my assumption. CO 60 sts and knit merrily on two car journeys and the ferry home. Try on sock. Notice with horror that there is skin showing through the holes in the pattern, which is not the case with the other Charades I have admired on the internet.


Knit on past the heel knowing that at some point I am going to rip this, pretending all the while to myself that I have faced my demons and am going to finish this sock if it kills the perfectionist in me.

Try on sock again. Note hole at heel flap join. Tear needles from sock in pique and chagrin. Leave sock mouldering in London while I jaunt off to my parents's house.

Return to London for the first meeting of my book club*. Write this post. Feel reconciled to sock, and determined to finish it. Start casting on with correct number of stitches, wonder if I should decrease a needle size to remove gaps in pattern, start swatching for something else (of course) and finally turn to you lot for help.

So, once again, I am seeking your good advice. First, please note the hole. It is only on one side, that of the second side of the heel flap from which I picked up the stitches (does that make sense?) which for some reason I found harder. The holey side:


The not so holey side:


Should I just rip back to here, correct it, and carry on? Or should I start again, equipped with the knowledge on how to pick dropped YOs successfully? (I pretended to myself that those times where I hadn't maintained the pattern were Persian flaws. Secretly, I believe that my knitting is uneven enough to constitute a flaw in its own right and I should try to make everything else as good as can be). You know which way I'm leaning, right? And if so, should I cast on for 64 sts with this needle size, or with the smaller needle size, which gives me an extra half a stitch per inch (an extra two in 4")? Or is that too small a difference to eliminate the little holes in the pattern, in which case should I go down another needle size? And in that case, should I in fact increase the stitch count? I do not, after all, want my sock to fall down. Or cut off my circulation.

In anticipation of your help, thank you. And in the meantime, have a great weekend!


*Yes, I am a granny in all but biological fact. I put my hair in a bun for work. I knit. I'm working on the rocking chair.