The Right Sock

Welcome to the Right Sock. Here I intend to chronicle my adventures in sock-knitting, allowing myself the ability to learn from my mistakes even after I’ve forgotten them, my sockwearers to give feedback on the socks I make them and ideas for requests, and other knitters ideas on what they might like to try (or avoid!). My sister, Joh, as my primary sockwearer, will pretty much coauthor, given that most of the comments will be hers. Please note that all comments are moderated and must actually add to the discussion of the socks; if you want to just contact me, see my Contact Me page in the sidebar. If you’d like to read about the rest of my life, particularly my woofus, Sunny—and can stand my whiny moments—check out the Wrong Dog Blog, down in the Blogroll in the sidebar.

So with no further ado, on to my very first pair of socks!

Stashbusters 1 stats

Pattern: The Sock Knitter’s Companion: Step-by-Step Help Sock

Size Intended: Women’s size 9 foot

Needles: Size 5 double-points (four of them)

Yarn: Saucy yarn, which is 100% mercerized cotton, in teal, spring green, and burgundy (the colors are much brighter in reality). I’m told Saucy is a worsted weight yarn, but it’s a little on the light side for that, I think.

Gauge: 2 in square = 11 stitches wide by 15 tall (I knit very loosely!)

Cast on: 48 stitches

Heel-to-toe length: 8 inches

Total foot length: 9.5 inches

Comments: I had to turn the heel three times because at first I didn’t grasp how the outside stitches were worked into the center. For anyone about to turn their first heel, I greatly recommend the video at Knittinghelp.com (look under View Videos, then Advanced Techniques, and then scroll down to “Turning the heel of a sock”). On the gusset on the first sock, I decreased in the wrong direction down one side and didn’t notice until I was weaving the ends into the finished sock. I made these ankle socks because I wasn’t sure how high Joh wanted her socks and because I wasn’t sure I had enough yarn. The toe is fairly boxy, but I decided to err on the side of allowing Joh more toe room. The pattern says that you should allow 2 inches for the toe; I did that and ended up with 1.5″ of toe, but I hadn’t decreased down as far as the next pattern, so I guess it makes sense that the toe was short.

For those of you not up on knitting lingo, a stashbuster is something that allows you to use up yarn left over in your stash. The yarn in these was left over from an afghan I crocheted for a friend. Joh calls them the bed socks because that’s how she uses them. (With that color scheme, she could hardly do anything else with them!)