Socktober: Better Late than Never

For many years in the online knitting world, there have been official and unofficial celebrations of "Socktober," or a month dedicated to knitting socks. I've never needed an excuse to knit socks and pretty much always have a pair on the go, but as the month finishes up, I've realized that my sock mojo has ramped up a bit. First, in all the excitement surrounding my trip to Rhinebeck (and all the craziness involved in preparing for it), I completely neglected to mention that I have a new sock pattern out! My Intrecciate Socks are in Knit Now issue 80, which I believe is now on UK newsstands. For those of you who aren't in the UK, fear not -- the pattern will be published in my Ravelry shop just as soon as I get the rights back (which should be sometime in the February/March 2018 time frame).

These socks are constructed in a fairly traditional way (cuff down, with heel flap and gusset), with a stitch pattern that consists of simple cables and some twisted stitches. I designed them to be gender neutral and suggested a semisolid or tonal yarn, but this colorful gradient is what I was sent. That's one of the things about publishing with a third party -- you have to knit up the sample in the yarn they send you! I rather like the bright colors, though I'm definitely going to be knitting up another sample in a more sedate yarn, because I think it entirely changes the look.

Of course, these sample socks were knit up months ago -- but there has been sock knitting happening more recently. Over the weekend, I finished up Rainbow's latest pair, and she was so thrilled with them that she wore them all last night (a big deal for someone who runs warm and almost never covers her feet at night) and declared that had today been a weekend, she would have continued wearing them all day!

They actually fit quite well, despite what they may look like in this photo. I worked these in basic ribbed cuff/stockinette leg and foot over 64 stitches on a size 0/2.0 mm needle and used a Fish Lips Kiss Heel. The yarn is ONline Supersocke 4-fach Season Color (just your typical superwash wool/nylon that will wear like iron), and while I was careful to start the second sock at the same point in the pattern and the sock match up nearly perfectly, if you look closely, you'll see that the very end of the toes don't quite match. I'm choosing to blame the yarn for that. Rainbow doesn't care, so I'm not sweating it.

I'm sure she would love me to knit her another pair, but up next is a pair for me. I've had this skein of Fibernymph Dye Works Bounce patiently waiting and now is the time. I'm obviously not going to finish these by the end of the month, but I've at least made a start.

This colorway is called Elvis Has Left the Building, and if you're not a Pittsburgh Penguins fan, then you won't know the reference (it's an expression one of the Pens' longtime broadcasters says when it's clear that they've one the game). All the Pittsburgh sports teams very conveniently share the same colors, so these can be my default socks for any "sportsball" event.

Finally, today is not only Halloween, it's also a special day for the blog -- on this day, 12 years ago, I published my very first blog post. Happy "blogoversary" to me!