Category Archives: Socks

Trekking socks and adventures with contact lenses

Yet more socks! These ones were knitted out of Trekking colour 100. This colour was very popular some time ago but for some reason I missed it then. After seeing the yarn actually being knitted, I knew I had to have some! It is definitely one of those colours which looks much better knitted up than it does on the ball.

Yet again the pattern is my basic ribbed sock pattern, these were knitted in my tired-and-brain-dead phase 🙂 I do love the colour, just putting them on makes the day a little brighter.

As well as my nice new glasses, I have been trialing contact lenses for the last week. It turns out that I am probably the most inept contact lense wearer on the planet. Never mind the first hurdle, I fell before I had even got out of the starting gate. The poor assistant who was teaching me how to put the lenses in and out had to put up with me taking nearly an hour to manage it, and then throwing my right lense on the floor. It turned out that that was the only one in my prescription that they had in the shop so they had to order me a new one. IÂ am improvingÂ and have got it down to only (!)Â 20 minutes now, although I did spend 2 hours on Monday with my left lense inside out. These are toric lenses so I think this is actually quite an achievement!Â I am persevering (or possibly just very stubborn) and after my appointment today they are ordering me in another set of lenses in what I hope will be a slightly better prescription than the trial set. All good (moderately) clean fun 🙂

The teal top is jogging along, I will try for another photo or two tomorrow. I am hoping that the sun will come out (the eternal optomist that I am). It is lovely now that the days are getting longer. It makes so much difference to my enthusiasm to actually do things, although a bit of sun too wouldn’t go amiss. I have been a little distracted from the knitting by the yummy looking silk and bamboo yarn that Elann has on sale at the moment. Both Cassis and Arles Teal have been looking at me since yesterday and my will is weakening, the only decision left is how much to order? I think it would make a gorgeous lacey summer top.

Riverside Socks

Japanese short rows

The two-colour hat is jogging along. It now looks much the same as before but slightly longer so I have spared you an update photograph. Instead I will share something else I have been working on.

I found a great tutorial on Japanese short rows and have been doing a bit of experimenting on my latest pair of socks. I found all the safety pins a bit cumbersome but very helpful for a beginner. I’m sure that once I have practiced a few times I wont need them anymore, but it is nice to be able to clearly see which loop needs to be picked up.

I definitely think I am getting a more even result than I normally do with wrapped short rows. With wrapped short rows one side of the heel seems to be fine, but the other side is a bit sloppy. I might have a go at the yarn over short rows as well, just to compare, but so far I really like the Japanese method. I am looking forward to trying it out on something other than socks too.

The yarn I am using is Blue Moon Fiber Arts, Socks That Rock Lightweight (100% merino) in colour Sunstone. It is a really nice yarn to knit with, very soft and comfortable. Their website is very dangerous, in the process of looking looking up those links I have found two new colourways I am keen on – oh dear.

Also the new Interweave Knits and Vogue Knitting magazines arrived this morning, so I am going to enjoy reading them while I eat my lunch.

Cashmere Socks

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Just a quick post with some more finished socks.

I’m afraid another rather dark picture, taken indoors in the depths of winter. These were made from fingering weight 100% cashmere from Colour Mart . I’m afraid I can’t remember what the colour was called, but it is 3 strands, one of dark red, one dark green and one navy twisted together. It makes a very nice mottled kind of effect when knitted up. The knitted fabric is beautifully soft although it does have a tendancy to stretch and then not spring back – a feature with cashmere. I think this yarn would make a fantastic drapey shawl, its just a question of deciding on the pattern …

More Christmas socks

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Well, it is the middle of February and I am still catching up with blogging about Christmas knitting!

These are the other pair of socks that I knitted for my Mum for Christmas. The yarn is Lucia , 30% cashmere, 70% merino, 4ply weight from the lovely Dee at Posh Yarn. The colour is Feather .

The pattern is my basic sock pattern again, with a 3 by 2 rib at the cuff, narrowing to a 3 by 1 rib for the leg, short row heel with gussets in the leg and foot, and a stocking stitch foot. I know a lot of people don’t like colours in hand painted yarn to pool, but I actually rather like the effect on these socks. I love the way the stripes of colours are different in the different sections of sock, and the way the different colours look depending on the number of stitches there are in the round, and so which colours end up next to each other.

I found this yarn more suitable for socks than the 100% cashmere 4ply yarn I used before . The merino gives the yarn greater elasticity although the cashmere is still luxurious. The big difficulty with using inelastic yarn for socks is the shape of a foot means that the sock has to stretch to get over the heel when you put them on, but you don’t want them to go baggy and fall down. Although I’m not sure about doing any more socks in 100% cashmere I do think this yarn would make a great shawl or scarf where the drape of the yarn would really benefit the pattern.

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I think the coloured Denise needles are a relatively new thing. The pink cables were a breast cancer awareness special edition, and the rainbow needles are dyed specially by Knitting Help.

Alpaca left-over socks

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As you may have noticed I have bitten the bullet and finally gone over to the new version of Blogger. I’m not sure if this will make much difference to you as you read. If there are any problems, let me know and I’ll work out how to fix them.

The snow has nearly all melted today and we are having a rather gray day. A perfect day for some nice indoor sock knitting! In the best Blue Peter tradition, here are some I made earlier:

These are made from the same yarn as the bullet proof socks, alpaca blend sock yarn (60% alpaca, 20% merino, 20% nylon) from Alpaca Plus , and using the same two stage cable pattern.
I knitted the brown sock first and then discovered that it weighed 65g which didn’t bode well for getting two socks out of a 100g skein, which explains the choice of a green foot for the second sock. This is very robust yarn and I actually snapped the tips off two of my Brittany birch sock needles while performing the cables!

Talking of birch sock needles, I have been having a think about sock needles generally and was wondering which were your favourites? I like to knit on 2.5mm needles and because I have wide feet and so quite a lot of stitches on the needles I prefer the 20cm long needles rather than the little short glove-type needles. I think my current favourites are Susanne’s ebony needles bought from Scottish Fibres (I notice this size is out of stock at the moment), with the Susanne’s rosewood needles a close second. I have a set of Brittany birch needles which really I am not that keen on, even though lots of people seem to like them. I have a pair of straight Brittanys in about a 6 or 6.5mm and I quite like them, they just don’t really seem suited to my way of knitting socks. I recently bought the Susan Bates pretty coloured set of small metal needles, and while I love them, they don’t come in a 2.5mm so they are not favourites. Also lurking somewhere I have a set of Inox bamboo sock needles but it has been so long since I used them I can’t remember whether I like them or not! So what do you like? I am a total sucker for needles of different sorts and would love to have recommendations for different ones to try.