Happy New Year! I hope that 2013 has got off to a good start for everyone. I have been plodding along with the Great Sort Out. The pile of magazines and books on my arm of the settee is still large but is decreasing by the day. It is now less likely to spontaneously avalanche and bury one (or both) of us alive.

I have been knitting away in the background. More socks from my handspun. I seem to be having a purple phase at the moment.

These are my first toe-up socks, and it was great fun! The pattern is called Having Hope by Diane Mulholland.

I used 2.5mm needles and 96g / 272m of handspun Southdown wool, and made the medium size.

Southdown is one of the softest of the down breeds of sheep, but it isn’t nearly as soft as merino or blue-faced leicester. It is very springy though, which should hopefully make good socks, and which shows the pattern up well. Hopefully it should wear well too. I like the way the colours have come out, a bit of variation for interest, but not so much that it obscures the pattern, and not too pink 🙂

The next pair used a pattern called Nemesis by Susan Dittrich (named for the Agatha Christie book).

Again I used 2.5mm needles, and made the larger size. As you can see I ran out of yarn on the toe of the second sock. I used a total of 125g / 280m. Most of the yarn is a handspun blend of merino wool in purples and greens from Wingham. I used a bit of the purple Southdown for the second toe. The socks will be in my shoes most of the time so I am going to call the different coloured toe an interesting design feature 🙂

I am looking forward to wearing both of these pairs of socks. I suspect the merino pair will wear less well over time, but I am enjoying experimenting with spinning for socks and seeing how the results come out. I am also getting a better feel for how much yarn I need for a pair of socks for me, which is handy for the future.