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Thursday, February 08, 2007

Finished: J's Valentine's Socks

Since these are his Valentine's Day gift, here's a little sock love for you:

Yes, I did take the time to arrange these socks into a heart. Why, did you want to see the typical sock shot? Okay, here you go:

Pattern: Gentleman's Plain Winter Sock (aka J's favorite sock) from Knitting Vintage Socks by Nancy Bush
Yarn: Universal Yarn Co. Pace (75% superwash wool, 25% polyamide), color 10, two skeins
Needles: Two 12" US 1 Addi Turbo circs
Started/Completed: February 1/February 7
Recipient: my darling fiance, for Valentine's Day (don't worry, he knows he's getting these and he's already seen them in progress)
Mods: decreased toes to 18 sts and grafted, rather than decreasing to 14 sts and pulling the yarn through all of them.
These are my February socks for SAM3. Although I already had a pair of socks in progress (the pair for my Sockret Pal, to be specific), I really wanted to follow the spirit of this KAL by starting and finishing a pair of socks in the span of the month. Although these socks are indeed a fast knit -- and they only took me as many days as they did because I spent many hours last weekend working on J's sweater instead -- stockinette takes longer when you're knitting for a foot that's 10 1/2" long!
When I got to the toe of the second sock, I encountered the same problem with more instep stitches than sole stitches as I had on the first sock. It was only at that point that I thought to take another look at the pattern -- and discovered that I was supposed to have transferred the two offending stitches from the instep to the sole stitches back at the beginning of the gussets. D'oh! I guess I don't have the pattern memorized, or at least not completely. Fortunately J won't care and is just excited to have another pair of socks in his favorite pattern. I'm just thrilled he finally let me knit him a pair in an actual color!
My spring Interweave Knits arrived today, so I could finally get a closer look at the patterns. I will definitely be knitting Grumperina's socks, and Eunny's socks are just gorgeous, although I have a feeling they'd be a project I'd start and never quite finish (not to mention that I don't think they'd be able to get up over my calves and I have no idea how to incorporate shaping into entrelac). One thing I really like about this issue is the new layout/design of the magazine. The pages seem a lot less cramped and the patterns are easier to read as a result. I also like the photo pages of the projects without the actual pattern, which gives you a chance to just consider the knit without having think about all the technical stuff yet.
Which project do you want to knit first from this issue?

5 comments:

  1. Oh, man! I was too lazy to get my mail after work! Now it's cold and dark and I have my PJ's on...what if my magazine is waiting for me out there in the cold? Your red SAM3 socks are cool. I like the heart photo. I didn't even see the heart until you mentioned it! :-)

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  2. I think I'm going to be making Grumperina's socks, but I'm going to have to fudge them to make them fit my feet, I think they'll be a little bit to narrow. I liked the brown cardigan (I can't remember what it's called, it was by Veronik Avery), but I don't know that it would look right on me.

    Are you going to the festival on Saturday?

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  3. The socks are great. I wish my hubby would let me knit more socks for him.

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  4. Lucky you - being able to knit such a bright colour for you other half. Me I'm knitting Railway Pattern socks from KVS in grey with light blue stripes (how exciting) Can't wait for IK to arrive - I recently subscribed so it will be my first experience, however it may take a little while to reach England so I'll have to wait in anticipation for a while.

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  5. Dang, you ARE the knitting queen! I started one on Feb 3, in WORSTED, on size SIX and I'm not even done with THAT. Part of it is because I'm usually comatose in the evening. :-)

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