Recently in Socks Category

[ETA: Marie left a comment that the Waffle House Socks pattern is available on her website. Click here! It's a free pattern. Why don't you make it perfect by purchasing a hank of Marie's Soft Spun Plus yarn?]

Yesterday, I completely forgot to post the details of Marie's Socks:

Pattern: Waffle House Socks

Yarn: Brooklyn Handspun's, handdyed, superwash sock yarn. colorway: Daring.

Needles: US2s, circular.

What did I change? Nothing. This was a test knit. I knit the pattern as it was written.

What did I love? I used the magic loop method for a toe-up design. Both were firsts for me, and together they might have changed the way that I knit socks.

What would I do differently next time: Somewhere, deep in the recesses of my knitting brain, is the way to do a more flexible bind off for ribbing. This is what I would do differently. On the second sock I tried casting off with a US3 (instead of the US2 that I used to knit the sock). It worked pretty well.

Marie's socks are finished!

I love them. They make me want to sit on the couch all day and stare at my feet. Okay, I would probably still want to do that without the socks.

Here's a closeup of the stitch pattern. It makes the socks feel squishy, and even softer.

Here's one more (not-so-great) photograph from above.

This project earns me the title of "Slowest Test Knitter Ev-ah". Hear that Thea? She's enlisted me as a test knitter for her Golden Cardi (so eager was I to get my hands on this knit that I begged and pleaded until Thea relented and let me be a test knitter for her design).

I think that I'm ready for a sweater project. I am reunited with my blocking board, and (unlike Queens) I have space in which to do the blocking. We'll see how long it takes me to get to the actual blocking....

That's no mystery, that's Sven.

Why he darns machine-made socks though, is a mystery to me. But, hey, whatever. It's not like he's asking me to do it. The sight of him bending over a thread, needle, and a pair of machine-made socks caused me to think. I make socks and I never darn their holes. My opinion is, why fix the holes when you can use it as an excuse to buy more yarn?

So, in the interest of sharing, I ask all of you, dear readers: do you darn your holes? [Here's where I should get all clever and got to some online place where I can create my own poll. Nope. Let's go low tech. If you care to answer, please do so in the comments.]

When we last saw Marie's sock, I was working my way around the heel.

Now, I'm making great progress on the leg.

Incidentally, this is the first picture that accurately catches this electric colorway. I love it.

Some of you might remember that this is my first attempt at magic looping my socks. So far, here are my observations about the the technique:

1. It's much easier to knit while standing on the train if I'm using magic loop. Now that my commute begins far from the beginning of my subway line (and thank goodness for that) this is an important development.

2. Once I switched to the all-over stitch pattern, instead of knitting half and half (pattern on the top of the foot and stockinette on the bottom) moving the needles on the sock became so much easier. I wonder if it wouldn't be better to knit the foot on DPNs and then switch to magic loop above the heel. But that's just me.

Today's post will be in reverse order from prior posts concerning out visit to Europe. I just couldn't resist the title.

When I last wrote about our trip, we were in Cologne. For New Year's, however, we went over to Prague.

Mmmm, mmm. I first visited Prague three years ago, and at the time I thought "Everybody has to go to Prague." I felt the same way this visit, too. Everybody needs to go to Prague! Quick, make those travel plans. I'll wait.

Done? Good. Being in Prague means that I can officially unveil my next-to-last 2007 FO:

Ta dah! If you remember, this was the hat that I started just before Christmas. I finished it "easily" before I left the US. If, by easily, you mean "reknit the top three times." Yep. Three times. The first time I knit the pattern "as written" (if, by "as written", you mean "adjusted for a different gauge). And upon finishing it I thought that it was much too short. It didn't reach my ears.

Okaaaaay, so I needed to frog back and add about an inch. Frog, frog, knit (is this now too long?), knit. And guess what? It was too long. Way too long. Grrrr. So, frog, frog, knit, knit. And, guess what? The second time that I knit the pattern the way I was directed to knit the pattern it fit pretty well. [Don't ask why, I don't know.] I admit that the photo makes the hat look a wee too long, but I think that my scarf was pushing it up from the back and pushing the brim slightly too far down.

The Details:

Pattern: The beret pattern was free from The Point, when I purchased yarn.

Yarn: Twinkle, Soft Chunky, colorway Urchin. One hank.

Needles: US15s, DPNs.

What I changed: I adjusted the pattern for a different gauge. Other than that, nothing.

Would I knit this again: Yes. I like the chunky appearance and easy shaping of this beret. It avoids the "hat head" I so dread this time of year.

Moving on to 2008, here's the latest on Marie's socks.

Not only am I perfecting my magic loop, I'm also learning a great new way to knit short-row heels. Or, rather, I'm learning this technique again, and this time the correct way. I thought I knew how to do this, but apparently I did not. This might explain why I found this technique fiddly the first time that I used it, and overall I saw it as only a slight improvement on the backwards-YO method.

But if you use this technique correctly (as I now am) it's a HUGE improvement over what I was doing before.

Lovin' this pattern! Whoo!