Darn It!!

by Vickie

I have been knitting socks for about 3-5 years. Twice now I have had this happen...These socks were blogged about here. They haven't made it two years yet which is disappointing to me, but I decided that repairing them would be cheaper and teach me something. I have never darned a sock before. Since I didn't have anyone to ask when I was ready to fix the hole, I went here to check out a video to learn how to do this.

I got a nice man who is part of a working club to make me this to use for my first effort at sock darning. I was trying to describe to him what I could remember from the internet as a darning egg with some sort of a handle. This is what he produced. I was very happy with it. It worked well for my first effort.
Then I started to darn my sock. I should have watched the video before darning because in the video it said to turn the sock inside out and I remembered that after I was more than half way finished. I just kept going and figured that I could chalk it up to yet another learning experience.

I thought a Chibi would do well for darning. After making several passes and not being able to "dig" the needle into the wood to catch the yarn, I changed to a more appropriate needle.
This is the view inside out. It doesn't look very pretty but it is fixed.
I am hoping that the next sock where I wear a hole in the ball of the foot, I can do a much nicer looking job with my repair. It's always good to learn something new and then to hone that skill. I have to say, I really never wanted to learn how to darn a sock but after paying at least $16 for a ball of sock yarn, it's cheaper to repair it than it is to throw them away and start all over. I am hoping to learn how to reinforce the balls of my socks so that I don't have to do this very often. Has anyone got some better ideas how to prevent the holes in the ball of a sock? Please share!

Spring Has Sprung!

Besides fall, spring is my favorite season. I love how things that used to be brown are turning green again. Life is beginning all over again. I am ready to get outside again and feel the fresh air and sun on my face. I love to open my windows and watch the lacy curtains twist and fold as the wind flows through. Sometimes I sneak off and close the bedroom door, open the windows and lay down on the bed lulled to sleep by the sound of a neighbor mowing their lawn. So my ode to spring this year has the perfect name and the perfect color.

I decided that a project that has been languishing on the needles for nearly a year needed to either move forward of disappear all together. I haven't frogged too many projects but it was time to say goodbye to these...and hello to these...
I found the pattern for these Spring Forward Socks on Ravelry. The pattern is free so I downloaded it months back and 10 days ago after my daffodils were pretty much done blooming I decided I needed more yellow in my daily life. Even though my favorite color is green, I have been more and more attracted to yellow over that last year. I am painting my bedroom walls yellow and have even gotten a bed set in yellow. Yellow and green represent spring to me and during the winter months when we don't see as much sun, those two colors help to hang on to what's around the corner.

These socks were knit on Tess' Designer Yarn Super Socks & Baby. I used the yarn from the pair above that I frogged. I love this shade of yellow and decided that since I was going to knit one pair of lace socks with this yarn, another pair was in order to replace the ones I just couldn't finish.

I started with #1 dpns and then decided after knitting the cuff and about 8 rows the sock was going to be too small. I really didn't want to start all over again so in mid-stream, I changed to size #2 dpns and finished both socks with those needles. One sock is a little more snug in the cuff but I am okay with that and I learned a lesson. I don't know if this holds true for anyone else but if I knit a lace pattern that has 60 some odd stitches I need to go up a needle size from #1s to #2s. If I knit socks that have 72 stitches or more I can to stick with 1s and still have them fit my Flinestone feet. I don't usually use any yarn for my socks except for sock yarn. I like how small and uniform the stitches are with #1s. I have only recently started using #2s and found then to be close to the results of 1s. I am not fond of big bulky looking socks.

I would knit these socks over and over because they are easy and look way more complicated than what they are.
Aren't they cute? They are super easy to knit and you get a great looking pair of lace socks. If you want to see another great pair check these out. They are even more wonderful than mine!