It's Sock Time!

It's Sock Time

I joined a group on Ravelry that is knitting socks all year round. I started off with the best of intentions but fizzled out when I lost my knitting mojo. When I finally found it, I knit all of those Waffleknit Dish/Wash cloths (40). It was mindless knitting that I could take anywhere and thankfully,they sparked my desire to knit again. Since then I have knit one pair of socks and have another pair on the needles. I helped someone put a border on a handspun knit gift for a wedding and a misc. scarf for a coffee shop owner where we gather twice a month to knit. I was just trying to burn up yarn and Angela said she liked it and it's found a new home. I know I have not made as much of a dent in my stash as I wanted but I have been trying.

I just finished these socks a few weeks ago but my blogging has been hit or miss lately. So here is the newest green socks with a pattern that I have used before. I truly love this pattern. I tried another yarn with this cabled pattern but it just didn't let the cables shine through so I frogged them and changed yarn.
As much stuff as I order from KnitPicks over the years, you would think that I would have actually ordered some yarn from them, but I have not. Well, at least not this year. Right before I knew I would not be ordering yarn, I went in with a mass order with some friends. So I ordered some yarn and this is one of the yarns I ordered. I think it's Stroll but I can't find the ball band. Here is the sideview of the sock. I didn't line up the cables very well for the photo op but they are there. There are two in the fron and two in the back up to here I put in the after thought heel. I love that heel! It's a bit annoying to pick up the stitches later, but the look is so worth it. I did not use reinforcement on the heel or the toe. I forgot. I like the extra strength but opps!
I know there is a huge ladder right down the front of the sock. I had a run-away stitch that I dropped and had to pick it up. When I did it made the ladder. I am hoping when the socks are washed and dried that will go away. These are some of the easiest socks I have ever knit. I would recommend this pattern to an advanced beginner who want to try cables.
Here is a more close up view. Can you tell I really love these socks. This is pair number three I have done with this patter and I think there will be more down the pike. Happy Knitting!

Same Song Different Verse

I already posted this pattern in my last post about Lavender Love. I said that I was doing the same pattern again. So here it is.
This time I can tell you the name of the yarn. I got smarter from hanging out with other knitters who told me to NEVER lose the ball bands. It finally sunk in!
This is sock yarn that I bought at Maryland Sheep & Wool. I think it was either last year or the year before. The yarn is from Tess' Designer Yarns. The business is based out of Portland Maine. It has a basic generic name. It's called Super Socks & Baby. The yarn is 80% wool and 20% nylon. The band says it's got approx. 450 yards. Since it says it can be machine washed and dried, I bought it. I seldom buy yarns where I have to hand wash. I am not really consistent with hand washing my socks.They always get washed in the washing machine, however I do use the octopus dryer I purchased from Ikea several years ago.
Here is my favorite foot model. She never complains and never frets about her pay.
I did the standard heel flap because the Lavender Love socks had the after thought heel. I hadn't done a standard heel flap in a while so thought I shouldn't forget how to to it. I like the way it looks and they are nice snug fit. I started out using 2.75 mm needles and then did the heel flap and on down 2.50 mm needles. I need to extra room towards the top but my foot narrows down around my ankles and I wanted a more fitted sock. Got it. Love, love, love the pattern. It's a walk in the park!

Irish Ale Socks

I asked for opinions about which sock yarn to use in honor of St. Patrick's Day and almost everyone has said the Yarn Tattoo Celtic Green was the best choice of my green yarns. So today I cast on with the Celtic Green yarn. I did however have to change my pattern choice. A friend gifted me a pattern she thought would be a good fit for the yarn I have. It's called Irish Ale Socks. I wanted to use a different pattern, but when I sat down and read the pattern I realized that I don't have the correct yarn for the socks. Since I am on a yarn diet this year, I can not purchase the size I want. So instead of fiddling with gauge, I decided the Irish Ale Socks would be a perfect substitute.
This is the picture that shows the Irish Ale Socks. The top cuff is done in white and that is for the foam on the head of the beer. Since Ale is pretty dark the body of the sock was done in black. I don't really want to do the white foam or the black but will do the whole sock in the Celtic Green.
Here is a larger view of the bumpiness of the pattern. Below is a reddish version of the same socks. I think the Celtic Green will do just fine.
So the project has begun. Thanks to everyone who posted a comment. I was hoping some of the lurkers would come out but maybe another time.

In Honor of

St. Patrick's Day, it was suggested that I knit a pair of Irish inspired socks. What a great idea! The only problem is I can't decide which green yarn I want to use. I have four choices for all my followers to check out and decide. Your opinions matter. I have chosen the design from Ravelry. They are called St. Brigid's Carnamoyle Stockings by Lahome Nally-Kaye. I love the cables and all the details. So below you will see all the green yarns that are more or less solid green. Some have subtle shading and others are solid. So let me know what you guys like. I love green so no matter what it will be a win/win situation for me!

Here is the group shot of all four greens. This is a teal sort of green and is by Tess' Designer Yarns

This yarn is by Yarn Tattoo. My friend Peg has a dye lab and she made this green called Celtic Green. It has different shades of green in it.

And the last one is from Schaefer Yarn Abigail. It's a more lime green color which is called Laura Hobson

Lastly this is Bright by Spirit Trail Fiberworks. This green is a more earthy green. So what do you all think? Those of you are not members of Ravelry will not be able to link but you can still weigh in with your pick of green for my March socks. Thanks in advance for everyone's help!

What to do?

I am beside myself about what to do with a pair of socks. I have no love for the yarn I used. I confess that I got caught up in all the excitement about the new product in 2007. I was a fairly new knitter when I bought this yarn. I don't think there were many of us at that time who knew too much about this yarn so we all jumped at the chance to try something new and trendy.

I just knew since this new product was a sock yarn, that I had to knit socks. I knit a very basic ribbed sock and wrote about them in this post. Then again in this post later. Now here I sit with some pretty pitiful socks that I used to love ready to toss them into the trash. This is what they look like now.

This hole is on the other foot that I didn't darn the first time in 2009.

Now there is a hole at the base of where I turned the heel. The heel was reinforced and the hole is right after the heel.

I have had the socks sitting here on my computer table for over a month just looking at them. Should I darn them? Should I unravel them and use the yarn for another project? Should I just throw them away. I have darned other socks but they have not developed another hole since. I have never unraveled a pair of socks to use for something else after having worn them for over three years. So having said all of that, you know I have NEVER thrown away a pair of socks. If this was any other yarn, I think I would unravel it and give it so someone who wanted the scraps, but I think this stuff is worthless as actual sock yarn. It has not been four years since I made these. November of this year be four years. So I am going to toss them. I am sad to throw away socks but I won't miss these. They have not worn well for me so they are going. I have another skein of this yarn but have decided to donate it to my Yarn For Supper group's grab bag. Maybe someone else will have better luck with them.

Lavender Love

I have a friend who has designed two pairs of socks. Her patterns are on Ravelry here. I was a bit nervous doing someone else's pattern that I hang with in a knitting group, but she promised me it was really easy. After a few moments of panic when my first pattern row did not come out, it went very smoothly. I love the pattern! It's great for a more advance beginner. I am past that but, still enjoyed the pattern so much that I am working on another pair with the same pattern. It's the kind of pattern you leave in your car or purse and knit on them when you have time to kill.

One of my knitting goals this year was to do cables in socks. This pattern has four little cables. There are two on the front and two on the back. Super duper easy. I did the standard 2X2 rib and then just took off from there.
I am still in love with the after thought heel. This pair was no exception. The patterning does not go on the back of the foot so it was extremely simple. For those who have never tried an after thought heel; it's like doing a toe for the heel. So I get my toes down to sixteen stitches then do the kitchner closing. The same was done to the heel. So I got a load of practice on the kitchner stitch.
Here is a closer look at the sock from the side. You can see the one cable that is on the front and one cable on the back. I tried on the sock and decided that it needed to be tightened up for around the ankle and foot. This sock was made for a larger size foot than a size 7/8. So I used a 2.75mm to start the leg. Then for the foot, heel and toe I changed the needles to 2.5mm. They fit like a glove.
I would love to tell you about the yarn, but I have had this yarn for a long time. I think I bought it when I was a "newish" knitter and didn't understand why you should save a ball band. So I have no idea what the stuff is but it's soft and springy. I really wish I knew what it was because I would buy more of it. All-in-all, these are a great knit. Thanks to my friend Ashley for coaching me through the first part of the pattern. They are totally lovely!

PS. How is my new camera doing with the pics? I am so glad to have a new one so that my knitting pictures look much better. Thanks to my sweetie!

Do It Right

Do It Right

You are all familiar with that annoying say, "Anything worth doing is worth doing right." I feel like that has been the bane of my existence since picking up knitting and crocheting back six years ago. I really thought that I could get away with a mistake here, there, and yonder and it wouldn't drive me mad. Ah... but it does. It's like a blinking beacon screaming my name every time I look at something with a mistake. I am a champion ripper. So I find myself at the cross roads of a decision.

My second pair of Spring Forward socks is that blinking beacon screaming my name. They have been screaming my name for a few weeks now. I have a drawer that is dedicated to my handmade wool socks. Every time I open that drawer to put on a nice well fitted pair of socks, those orange Spring Forward socks stare me down.

(Sorry for the poor quality of the photo. My camera was having a tantrum and will soon be going to a time out for good!)

One sock is longer in the foot than the other and I avoid dealing with them but not wearing them. How long can I avoid it? This winter, next winter or the winter after? They will languish in the drawer and I will have to look at them every time I open it.

I can't take it anymore so I am going to fix my big fat honking make. I have no idea how I got one larger than the other in the foot but I did. I foolishly thought I could handle it. I can't. Does that mean that I have sock mistake OCD?

So today I am doing my best to find the places where I wove in the ends from closing up the toe. Then there will be teeth gnashing and moaning as I rip row after row of reinforced toe to get to the rest of the foot. Ugh!

Finally found the place where the threads were woven in and the re-knitting process is taking place. To be honest, it's going on the third time I have knit this one toe. Yesterday while knitting with friends I picked the wrong size needle (2.50 mm) and just knit away. Then later I discovered a mistake and ripped out the toe again. Today I am home alone and figure that if I have total quiet, no phones ringing, and the dogs are sleeping, I can actually get these puppies done!

TADA...I got them done and they both fit the same way. I finally got a picture of them today. I am so glad I ripped them out and made them right. Now I can wear them all winter and not worry about them starring me down from the sock drawer.

Anything worth doing is worth doing right. Sometimes things are more right than others but these are right on target! So I am going to sit back and admire my handywork!

The Unspeakable

There is a running joke with myself and my knitting friend Cheryl who move to Arizona this past fall. Our joke was about how private our stashes are. A girl never kisses and tells and she never shows her stash. I posted on Facebook the other day that I was reorganizing my stash. It's sure not because I want to, I have to. A smaller closet in our master bedroom is going to be sheet rocked up and made into a solid wall for more space in our room. The nice part the whole process is, the closet that backs up to the master bedroom closet is in my office. That closet wall will be torn down and then that will extend the "office" closet. Since I am no longer in business, I have decided that the spare room will now be my hobby room and my stash will be stored there. So decluttering, reorganizing and rearranging is taking place a little bit everyday until it's done.

I had cleaned out the small master bedroom closet a few years ago and got rid of all my cross stitch, flower arranging, candle making and any other hobby I had stuff. So much stuff that I got eight large black plastic bags of stuff. I didn't feel a thing when I got rid of all of it. There is still much in the closet that needs to go so the second purging cometh.

All knitters are curious about another knitter's stash. While I am not going to show all of mine, I will show how I have been organizing it so it makes sense when I go to look for something for a project. Remember I am not buying any yarn this year and after looking at what I organized today, it might have be extended to two or three years...plain and simple-I have WAY more stuff than I need and realized.

My stash has been split between large bags of yarn for afghans and sweaters in the closet and the rest of the stuff in baskets on a bookcase and eight plastic drawers sitting out in the bedroom. So here is how I have started organizingI . I bought four new larger drawers yesterday and have been trying to get things off the shelves and into the drawers.

I bought these drawers at Big Lots (a discounted store like a Dollar Tree store), but I am sure that you can find these at Walmart, K-Mart, Target and the Container Store. I bought four of the largest size they had yesterday. In a few days will go back and look for four more. Yes, I did say four more. I have not even gotten into the closet stuff yet so I am going to need more drawers.

Okay here is how I start rearranging things.

I divided my sock yarns into two drawers. One drawer is sock yarn in skeins.
Sock yarn in hanks is the second drawer.
I needed two drawers for misc types of roving that needs to be spun. Drawer #1
Roving drawer #2. I still have five processed fleeces underneath the bed in rolling double sided sweater boxes. There are also two plastic tubs; one with crochet threads and one with acrylic yarn.
A cotton drawer.
Two drawers are dedicated to my hand spun. One is a drawer with hanks.
The second hand spun drawer is the stuff that is caked up already.
Another drawer is just lace weight.There are two drawers with just misc fun fir, ribbon and spooled yarns.
Misc. yarn drawer #2 . I have two more drawers left. One has nothing but my handmade wool socks. Since I don't want any winged creatures eating my socks I have put them in their own drawer with cedar blocks to project them year 'round. Then there is a drawer that has some acrylic yarn in it. That will be moved and condensed down after I get two or three more drawers. I want one drawer dedicated to acrylics that I want to keep, one for baby yarn and the rest to go for the bags of yarn for sweaters and afghans that are sitting in the closet right now with no where to go.

I still have these items to contend with...
This basket holds the two mitered square blankets that I have set aside for awhile.
There are plenty of things like this still in the closet. One bag has the last KnitPicks order of yarn for 2010. The basket is filled with Alpaca skeins to make my husband a scarf. I want this stuff in drawers so it's more organized and I know where everything is. I am not even going to show the closet. It's just too messy for public consumption. I will show you more drawers another time after I get them together.

So I did something I swore I would never do-show my stash. Well sort of show it. I will never drag it all our for display. It just takes too much time. Besides, I told Cheryl I would never show my stash and I am sticking to that...sorta.

January Socks

Most of you know, I am a very proud and excited member of Ravelry. If you are a crocheter, knitter, spinner or dyer, you really should join the sight. There are discussion boards from A-Z. I joined a board that challenges me to knit one pair of socks a month and I have finished the January socks.

I have knit this pattern before and posted about it here. So I thought they would be easy the second time around, are they didn't fail to deliver! I love these socks because they fit and they look good. They are not too plain and not too girly.

Here they are! The yarn is Austermann Step. I used 2.75mm KnitPick nickel dpns. They are my favorite sock needles. So worth every penny.
Here is another view of the pattern.
Here is a really good close up of the pattern. Can you tell I love these socks?? I also love Austermann Step yarn. It is so soft and the yarn seems to wear well for me. So there they are...first completed socks for the year 2011. I have eleven more to go! Feb pair will be cast on shortly after I finish what I am working on right now.

Back to Basics

Back to Basics
I haven't really been knitting very many socks this past year. I have forgotten some things so I decided to go back to some things basic about how I knit socks that fit my feet. I learned and completed one pair of toe up socks. During making those toe up socks I learned how to do an after thought heel.

Here is my first toe up sock.

I used Bare from KnitPicks because it was left over from this project. I really didn't see any need to waste perfectly good yarn. So I did the sock class in the Bare. I think I mentioned in the post about the Vortex shawl that this kind of Bare has been discontinued. So that the finished socks extra special.

Not only are the socks above special because of the yarn and the first time method but I learned something else. I learned how to make an After Thought Heel. It seemed pretty easy until didn't pick up a stitch with the waste yarn and had to pull out several rows on both sides of the waste yarn to fix it but it did work. I can say that I have worn them about four or five times, washed them and dried them and they are still together. So I guess I did okay.

Feeling all special about making the above socks I tried my hand at some other socks that I had knit before.

What a mess! The yarn is lovely, the color is lovely but the fit, well...I don't think that went as well as I had planned. One foot is longer than the other. I love the pattern, Spring Forward. I love the texture and the lace work.
So after getting a high from the top pair, being put in my place with Spring Forward I decided to go back to basics. My very first sock was a basic rib pattern. For this next pair I did the cuff in a 2X2 ribbing and the rest of the sock in a 3X1 ribbing all the way to the toe. I used 2.75mm KnitPick dpns with 64 stitches.
The yarn is Lana Grossa Meilenweit 100g Uni/Solid. I guess I have had the yarn for a while or maybe it was given to me but I getting a color number from the label was rough. If you are a Ravelry member you can check out my project page under VAPurl. I hope the picture shows that the colors are a cream, blue/green and a navy blue with a touch of grays thrown in. I am not fond of blue but these are okay. Not so bad...for shades of blue, gray and green.

I knit basically two long ribbed tubes. At a certain point I had to use some waste yarn to hold my place to open up to insert the after thought heel. Once I did that and continued up to where the decreases were supposed to start. I got a bit nervous about how long the foot was after my last pair of socks. So the person who taught me how to do the toe ups told me to put the stitches for the heel on waste yarn and try the socks on so I could see where the decreases need to start for the toe. So here are my pics. So here is the beginning of putting the live stitches back on to the dpns and then they went on to a chibi with more waste yarn.
Here is the heel all on waste yarn and ready to try on.
Here are the socks that are just about ready for the heel and the toe. After trying them on I decided that I needed to rip the foot back about 5 rows and then will make the toe decreases. Having some basic sock knitting skills and no pattern is helping me learn more and more every time. I am getting better. What amazes me is that I still love making socks after all this time. I would give my eye teeth to attend Sock Summit in Portland, Oregon this year in July. I don't know if I could keep up but it sure would be fun to talk about socks to others who get just as excited as I do about them.
Here is the completed after thought heel. I believe I still need to tweak how many stitches I need for teh last row to kitchner. Right now it's 16 but I think I might try 20 next time. Below is the completed sock. Yeah!
So now it's on to the next pair. This pair was started in December so it's not my very first pair started and completed in 2011. The pair I am working on now will be the first pair of 2011. It's something I have knit before so stay tuned.