The first sock for Summer of Socks is done. Except for sewing in the ends, but better not to do that at 3AM.
Interestingly, in this Cherry Tree Hill Supersock DK the pink flashed up the sole and back of the leg. The blue flashed on the front, but it doesn't jump out at you like the pink.
Sorry I have no nice sock blocker for photography, yet.
Yeah, It's after 2 and I just posted less than an hour ago (ignore the time on the earlier post - 11:30 PM means I posted late and wanted the previous date stamp on it).
But I feel pleased with my sock toe and just took some more pictures.
Here's the pinker side with two more rounds than the last photo.
And here's the bluer side with another two rounds.
One more set of increases to do on the toe. I'll do a plain foot and enjoy the yarn pattern. Maybe I'll throw in something on the leg.
As I get away from the tip of the toe and have more room to works my gauge loosens up a bit. I estimate a current gauge of about 7 spi.
I really need to figure out how to improve those corners.
I'm a little behind in my blog duties.
Here's a bit of distraction from the lack of blog excitement. Call it Friday Eye Candy if you like, though it's low-keyed eye candy.
My sister visited for 5 days. We had a great time. Took advantage of some great weather and walked a lot. Ate dinner out every night at all our favorite places.
Read a few blogs and did a bit of knitting but not as much of either as usual.
She left this morning. I read blog posts all day and Bloglines tells me I still have 55 to go. I need to figure out a way to keep up when other parts of my life happen.
I did get a very little bit more done on my CTH Spring Frost sock. The corners of my figure eight cast-on are a bit wonky, but I think some of it will sort out in the first washing or two. I don't have much stitch tightening to do.
The weather changed and my camera used the flash for outdoor photos today. The colors washed out to lighter and less grayed.
My gauge on the US2/3mm Addi Naturas runs 7.5 sts per inch with this yarn; pretty firm for DK but not stiff and nice for a sock. The one problem is the strain on my eyes from working this small gauge.
Between bouts of sock toe, when my eyes needed a break I got several inches done on my Pinnate Schaeffer Lola scarf. After reknitting the same three inches three times on Tuesday, I have a groove going on this pattern finally. The pieces measures 12 inches long, a bit more than in the photo. I estimate close to 1/3 done. That easily stretches to 15 or 16 inches. This should come out just the size I like after blocking.
Boy, is the color bad on that photo. Maybe I should read the camera owner's manual or something.
Errands got done today, so tomorrow's free for lots of blog-reading and knitting, eyes willing and the creaks don't rise.
Total OT - did you know the grammar in 'God willing and the Creek don't rise' is correct? It refers to the Creek Indian tribe, thus the capital C, and a period of 'uprisings.'
I sort-of swatched for the sock I started today for the Summer of Socks in Cherry Tree Hill's Supersock DK 'Spring Frost.' I hadn't worked with this yarn before and had no idea what needle size I needed.
I knit loosely, so I'm usually down a size or two from the one called for on the yarn. Also, I like a fairly firm fabric, but not so firm my hands suffer from the knitting.
The needles sizes I tried included US3, 2, and 1. The 3s and 2s were Addi Natura; 3.25 and 3.0mm. These two sizes look the same and my needle gauge measures 2s as 2.75mm, so doesn't differentiate between these two Addi sizes.
I used an Addi Turbo for the US1/2.5mm. I find the turbos annoyingly slippy.
Based on knowing that I knit a bit more loosely flat than in the round and on wanting to use the bamboo needles, I went with the US2/3.00mm.
For this sock I'll do toe up and wing it on the pattern. I started with a figure eight cast-on. The instructions I have for this cast-on use double points or magic loop. I'm interpolating for two circulars.
The fabric I'm getting is just what I want. The edges of the toe are funky, though. I have a couple of holes I think I can fix by tightening up the first row, though the rest of the row looks good. I'm not sure about the sort-of sloppy looking stitches along the edge. I think they're my m1s.
I'll look at this again in the morning and decide if I proceed or I rip.
I made some progress on my Pinnate Scarf. I actually hope for something that blocks to the size of a small shawl. I estimate my skein will give me 1 foot by 3 feet, unblocked. The stitch feels like it will really expand in the blocking.
JINX ON YOU
The Green Sock #2 Jinx continues.
While at Churchmouse Yarns yesterday, I grabbed another skein of green yarn. It was the wrong green.
The label tells me this is 017. The bands from my used yarn read 016. It's definitely darker. I can't exchange it until Monday.
The heel also has several small holes along the short-rowing edge.
NEEDLES IN A HAYSTACK
I was at Churchmouse for a class given by Karen Alfke titled Confessions of an Organized Knitter. We share our organizational obsession.
One of the tips I learned will be very helpful as I'm one of those knitters with so many needles that I never know where all of them are. They end up in various projects and project bags rather than their file box home.
Karen uses a system similar to a classic library card system to keep track of her needles. She notes on an index card what needles she has removed from storage to put with which project. The card stays where the needles normally live until they return.
When I set up this system I'll talk more about the details.
TWO TOES
My 2-at-once socks look pretty good and fit well. However, I need about 3 1/2 more inches of foot plus gussets by 9AM Sunday.
Spousal-Equivalent's parents arrive for an overnight visit sometime tomorrow. I must get groceries before they get here.
At least S-E's family are all knitters or former knitters, so I have hope they'll tolerate my mad push to get the socks to where they need to be.
I've made some progress on the Small Not-Pink Thing.
Green sock #2 seems to suffer from Second Sock Jinx. The jinx is not mine; it's on the sock.
This is the sock with the over-tight provisional cast-on that wouldn't present loops when pulled. Then the working yarn a few inches from the stitches got caught in the zipper of the project bag. That required cutting and starting a new end.
Now, it's run out of yarn.
I forgot from the first pair of green socks that I can't get a swatch and 2 socks of the desired height out of 3 skeins. I won't get more yarn until Thursday.
The sock's in a time out until then.
I turned the heel on the second green sock. I've now reached about the same point I had on my first pair of socks when I put them down and didn't get back to them for 2 years.
This time I've printed out directions for several different toe and heel techniques. I have yarn already for 4, maybe 5 more pair, including that for the 2-at-once-toe-up class. Though I knit my first two pair for Spousal-Equivalent, all but one of my planned pairs are for me.
And today I reached a turning point. I had time to walk, but took a bus so I could work on my socks.
Astute readers will notice that, despite my new enthusiasm for sock knitting, there have been no pictures nor mention of a re-done pair of toes on a magic loop.
I think I've been procrastinating by knitting a second sock.
Tomorrow I have a completely free day. I plan to tackle 2-toes then, perhaps more than once, with some breaks of basic 2x2 ribbed green cuff.
If things don't go well, William, the class instructor, works and is available for questions on Sunday.
Turns out I'd worked my provisional cast on overly tight so the stitch loops lay flat on the edge of the work.
Usually I knit loosely except, apparently, when attempting a new technique.
I did get them picked up and knit with great difficulty and a slip from US 3s to a US 1 1/2 needle, but resulting in a noticeable line. That side is now the bottom of the foot.
Also, the difference in guage made for a larger gap between the two completed sides than on the first sock, requiring some picking up and then decreasing away of stiches to close.
Not a really obvious difference from Sock #1 once done.
So, we have progress on one toe. And a plan to practice provisional casts ons.
The 2-at-once toes will wait until tomorrow afternoon. I have a spa appointment and should be in an appropriate frame of mind for tricky new techniques afterward.
Astute readers of this blog (not that there are many readers of any kind yet) may have noticed a pattern of postings at precisely 11:30 PM.
As I write this my computer shows 2:44 AM. I often compose my posts after midnight Pacific time. A post with this time stamp would result in a gap in the dates of my posts. Not acceptatable currently.
The actual issue is a goal I set of a post every day for my first month. A tactic to make this a habit. In the long run, I'm sure I'll post at the time I write.
For now, though, I may appear unusually punctual. Actually, I'm just a night person with some hormonal sleep issues.
Today's knitting tasks started off well. 
First I tackled the issue of getting the yarn for my 2 socks at once project into two separate balls rather than one ball and a swadge of tangles.
I started with this:
...and I ended up with this.
And I only dunked the yarn in the coffee once.
The mess really wasn't the yarn's fault. Besides pulling from both ends of one ball on a project that involved a lot of turning, I frogged my guage swatch and left it in a pile from which one of the ends came.
Didn't get to restarting the 2 toes, however.
I decided to start Green Sock Toe #2 first, on the theory that it was the easier project.
The pick-up for the provisional cast on seemed easier this time around. I short-rowed along without incident until I turned the toe and started back up the other side.
Then I put it down.
When I came back to it I skipped a second wrap and didn't notice until ready to pick up the partially-existent wraps and knit. Learned I don't know how to unknit short rows. Frogged back farther and farther, couldn't even get the intial pick-ups re-picked-up straight, and ripped to the crochet chain. Cut off most of the mangled yarn and began again.
Looks beautiful, huh? But lurking on the other side is a provisional cast on that does not yield nice live stitch loops as it's pulled out.
A somewhat impotent one-toe orgy rather than the multiple toes promised.
Thank goodness tomorrow is a knitting circle day. I'll see if Karen can deduce what I did and if it's salvageable. The project bag already holds enough yarn to start again, if needed.
Between the first and last photos I did get some sorting and straightening done in both the guest/project room and the basement. Between that and the rewinding, things were accomplished.
And we had more sun than rain. Also an accomplishment here in Seattle.
Lilac Time Piet Hein http://chat.carleton.ca/~tcstewar/grooks/ I 'performed' that poem in June of 1971 for the end-of-year show in one of my high school English classes. I was 17 and wore an empire-waist dress; very short with puffed sleeves, in a lilac-grounded print of little sprigs of lilacs. My mother was in the audience. So, today looked like this: My hands have three different kinds of thorn tips in them. I'll have a reaction to them by morning. My fingernails no longer have mud under them, but they still need some serious attention. I think I sunburned my nose. Not good, as I have a family history of melanoma. Along the edge of the drive in 4 flats are 50 pots of hellebore seedlings I'll need to baby through the summer. It was a great day. Green sock #1 has been bound off and woven in. I tried my friend Karen's suggested bind off first. "For that stretchy bind-off, try a Decrease Bind off (K2togtbl, then place resulting st on left needle and repeat)." Didn't like how it worked with the 2x2 ribbing. Thanks anyway, Karen. I want to try this one on the bottom of a top-down sweater. Then I tried doing a Decrease Bind Off in pattern with P2togtbl. Looked odd and was a pain to do. Next I used Grumperina's stretchy bind off. "Work 2 sts in pattern (either knit or purl). Move yarn to back (if the last worked st was a knit, this is already the case). * Transfer the 2 worked sts to the LH needle, and k2togTBL. Work 1 st in pattern (move yarn to back if it was a purl), * repeat between *. Important Note: I use a larger needle to do the bind off." http://www.grumperina.com/knitblog/archives/2006/06/so_i_knit_him_a_1.htm Not as stretchy as the method I finally used; a standard bind off done loosely in pattern. I didn't even go up in needle size. It came out great. Tommorrow will be an orgy of sock toes. I plan to start the next green sock (a short-row toe with provisional cast on) and redo the 2 socks at once figure-8 toes. The prediction is rain all day.
The lilacs are flowering, sweet and sublime,
with a perfume that goes to the head;
and lovers meander in prose and rhyme,
trying to say --
for the thousandth time --
what's easier done than said.
...and I spent it working in the garden.
It was a lovely day in the neighborhood, so I walked across downtown Seattle to my 10 AM class at So Much Yarn; Two Socks at Once, Toe Up, using Magic Loop (one long needle). Thrilling and terrifying title. I ordered my latte caffeinated.
The 4 of us around the table were all fairly practiced knitters in general but not in either socks or magic loop. I thinks my 1 1/2 pair may have been the most sock experience. Everyone had done magic loop for projects other than socks. We all preferred 2 circulars to double points.
Still, when we started two figure-8 cast-ons side-by-side, suddenly we became beginners who could hardly hold the needles much less get the yarn where we wanted it to go. Apparently our experience was pretty typical.
But here they are: 2 separate things that are decidely sock toes on the same circular needle. The many mistakes and malformed stitches don't even show much, either.
The figure-8 cast-on is a whole new set of movements that my hands and brain need time to assimilate. Knitty has a toe-up sock article from Winter '02 with photos and instructions on 3 toe styles, including the figure-8, on 5 double-point needles. They call it tricky.
William encouraged us to rip out and redo once or twice for the practice before next class. I'm one of two of us who developed laddering between the first and last stitches on our leading edge, so I want to deconstruct what caused that. I have extra needles and yarn to play with and 2 weeks to get to the heel turn.
Oh, and I definitely need to rewind into 2 balls of yarn. Working from 2 ends of one ball is not a good thing. Another universal experience for our small group. Statistically significant despite the small sample size.
Walked home, packed the essential knitting projects and perishable food in the car, and caught a ferry to our place on Bainbridge Island. Once here I recovered from the rigors of the morning with a cat on my lap and a simple 2x2 ribbed sock leg on my needles.
Tomorrow I conquer weeds and a stretchy bind-off. Reassault of the figure-8 will wait 'til Tuesday.
The rain returned this evening. Made for light crowds when I ran errands.
Even the staff at Whole Foods commented on how quiet the store was. They seemed to be enjoying the respite before tomorrow's Earth Day activities.
A warning for any non-knittiers reading this: the rest will be geeky sock-knitting stuff. Hi, Mom.
I decided to tink back my K2tog rounds rather than doing increases right after my decreases. Spousal-Equivalent really could use a bit more fabric around the point where his arch ends and heel begins. Around the ball of his foot where size is usually measured, the fit is almost loose. By the top of his arch, the ribs strech out flat even with over an inch of increases. High arches.
I ran the heel stockinette to 3 1/2 inches above the heel turn, then increased 3 stitches on each side for some leg room before starting to rib all the way around. Conveniently, the knit into the front and back increase I used blended into a purl rib.
Before I started reknitting what I'd tinked, I picked up the slack thread between two stitches that caused the hole I'd noticed. I've now found 3 more smaller holes. I expect the 2 at once toe-up sock class I start tomorrow will use a short-row heel. We should learn ways to avoid these holes.
A ribbed top of the foot seems essential to the fit of socks for S-E. Maybe that's why he always chooses that style. And why he wears Birkinstocks.
For his next pair of socks, I think I'll try a ribbed increase on the sides of the top as I move up the arch. Then I'll decrease back down for the ankle and up again in the ribs at the back as I approach the calf.
Yeah, I'm a process knitter. In my mind the first few socks are for learning. It won't bother me if they don't get much wear.
Better get my swatch done for my class so I can get some sleep.
It's Spring today in downtown Seattle. Cherry blossom petals clog the gutters. Even the most stressed of the street maples show signs of green leaves.
When I walked to Pilates at 11:30 this morning the thermometers read 47, though it looked like it should be warmer. Women's apparel ranged from cabled sweaters and jackets to silky T-shirts, strappy sandles, and goosebumps. I wore the sweater and jacket.
At 5 PM it's 59 and glorious outside. We plan to walk to the Ballet's Celebrate Seattle Festival, as we did last night.
Much more damp gloom will hang around here before summer weather arrives sometime after the Fourth of July. For now, we've shared our rain with Southern California, who needs it much more. And the sidewalks are elbow-to-elbow with people grateful that these little previews of summer happen in the Pacific Northwest.
Spousal-Equivalent tried on the sock foot and declared it to fit. I think I need to add a couple ribs to accomodate his high arch. He'll need them in the leg, too.
Also discovered that his heel is taller than the standard 2 inches. He wants another inch and a half of stockinette before I start ribbing all the way around.
I really like this toe-up sock thing.
