G. Knerd

I wish sometimes that I lived in Germany.  Not, mind you, that I know much German, but I think I could pick it up pretty quickly, and I know that enough people in Germany speak English that I could definitely get by.  Germany is where the sock yarn comes from, and is the only place I know of where you can get Soccer (aka Football) team inspired colorways in your sock yarn.

I bought this in Germany when I was touring Europe after college, and lucked out because the Soccer Team yarn was apparently last year’s style and was all on clearance – I scored this one for Portugal as well as some yarn for Germany, Denmark, and Brazil, and all on a former college kid’s budget (or lack thereof).

The ball looks a little rough, since it’s been marinating in my stash for almost five years and has already been through one failed attempt to become socks.  This time around, I’m going with something that I’m pretty sure will look awesome with just about anything:

A slightly modified version of Hourglass.  Basically, I changed the cuff to k1tbl p1 rib, added another repeat around to make them fit my feet, change the heel to my standard pseudo auto-heel, modified how the pattern edges work on the instep, and changed the toe to my standard smooth-decreases-around one.  But other than that I followed the pattern as written – oh, except that I moved the flower medallions inside the arches up a row so that they were more centered between the curves, rather than what was obviously written to be knitted flat with the YOs happening on the same row as the moving stitches.

Okay, so maybe these are more inspired by Hourglass instead of actual implementations of Hourglass.  Still, I love this pattern.  It’s saved me before from a failed attempt at sock creation, and as I’ve said before it knits up super quick.  I’m not sure why when it’s got plenty of fiddly one stitch cables and most of the stitches are purls, but there you have it.  Fast, fun, works with all yarn patterns, comfortable to wear, and interesting to look at.  You couldn’t dream up a better pattern if you tried.

Then again, I’ve only tried it with a tweedy solid, a marl, and now stripes.  It might not work on insane yarn…but even if it didn’t, I would still love it for all the other places it can be used.  And, really, who can blame a pattern for not looking good when used with a yarn that looks like clowns conspired to make us all sick?

While I was on my honeymoon several months ago, I decided to start knitting a pair of socks.  I had grand plans for the pattern, but in the interim took a bit of a break and then realized that I couldn’t remember what that plan was.   I also started feeling a bit of animosity toward the pattern, but since I am delusional and I am not a quitter, I kept going.

Anytime someone would see me knitting those socks, they’d ask who they were for, “Like, a kid or something?”  And I’d laugh, and say they were for me, and demonstrate that they were actually quite stretchy.

Unfortunately, they’re not stretchy enough.  They barely (and only with a lot of swearing and some lost skin) fit over my heels.  Once they’re on, they fit like a dream, of course, but if it takes me five minutes to put on my socks in the morning I’m not going to be a happy camper.

Of course, I blame the yarn.  This was the last set of Deborah Norville yarn I had in the stash, and I haven’t had a single positive experience with that stuff.  With any other yarn, 72 stitches would have been enough to fit around my heel (I’ve got some socks with 68 stitches in them and they fit just fine), but with this yarn…no.  It’s just not working out.

I don’t think I’m the only one that feels that way either – Monkey Kitty did the usual thing and came to investigate the knitting as soon as it hit the floor…

…and not 10 seconds later, he was walking away again – apparently, this yarn isn’t even good enough to chew on.

So now, I just have to find someone who has smaller heels than I do, that I don’t really like too much, but who I like enough to give them hand knit socks.  Thoughts?

Every now and then, I put down a knitting project only to come back to it weeks or months later and realize that I have no idea what my past self was thinking when I was knitting on it earlier.  Generally, it’s obvious that I had a plan and that I had every reason to believe that it would go well, but when I come back to it I have absolutely zero recollection of what’s going on anymore.

It’s at times like that where I wish I could go back in time and just ask myself, “What were you thinking?”  Mind you, in these circumstances it’s not in the smack-myself-in-the-face, what-were-you-thinking way, but a calm, interested hrm-didn’t-quite-follow-you-there, could-you-explain kind of way.

For example, I started a pair of socks while The Blanket Thief and I were in Europe.  I wanted something relatively simple, but not so simple that I was bored, so I decided to make up a two-cable traveling pattern that’s inspired by a couple kids playing tag.  The idea was that one cable would chase the other back and forth across the socks, bouncing off of the “walls” and going through a round of tagbacks whenever they crossed.

Recently, I dragged these out of the basket and started working on them again, only to pause and realize that the back cable crossings (above), didn’t match the front cable crossings (below).  Namely, while on the backs I’d apparently decided to stop moving one (but only one) of the cables, on the front I’d kept at the full pattern as established.

I spent a good amount of time trying to figure that one out.  The back was going to turn into the heel, so was I planning to have the one cable travel to the other side of the sock and mirror the placement of the first, stopped cable?  Had I intended the first cable to double back and meet the other one, to kind of check on why it hadn’t started?  Was it even possible that this had just been an accident, and I somehow hadn’t managed to pick up on it for four rows?

Eventually, I decided that, barring time travel, I was never going to figure out what the plan had been, and without a plan it was just silly to continue with a deviated pattern.  With that decision, it was time to engage the Knitting Surgery.  I picked back the four rows of the affected stitches, making a neat-but-really-confusing section.

Then I knit it all back up in the original pattern to match the front.  I’ve got a new plan for how it’s all going to go now, and I’m sure it’s much better than my original plan.

At this point, though, I really hope I never do run into my past self to ask her what the original plan was.  I don’t want to find out that I’m wrong, and really her plan was much better than mine if I could have just remembered it.

In the past week, I’ve done exactly zero knitting.

I know.  I’m shocked too.  I didn’t know it was possible for me to live without knitting for so long.  I don’t even have a good explanation for it, either – I wasn’t injured, I wasn’t trapped anywhere without yarn, and even though yesterday was Erica’s wedding (which was lovely), I really wasn’t even that busy this week either.  (If you’re thinking of getting married, by the way, I really think you should talk to her about the magic she pulled together.  The whole month before her wedding, she turned down any and all offers to help with, “Oh, no, don’t worry about it, it’s totally under control.”  And she wasn’t lying at all.)

Frankly, I think I must be ill.

I didn’t even touch the Wedding Blanket, even though I’m finally at the last (infinite) step of sewing on the border.

Nor did I knit anything on the Wedding Blanket II, despite the wedding this weekend being near perfect motivation.

If I’d wanted variety, I could have worked a bit on the Blanket Thief‘s cARGHdigan, which has been sitting patiently in a box next to the couch for months while I was distracted on Wedding Blankets I and II.  (Note to self: next time, don’t promise husband a sweater until after said sweater is done.  Also, don’t encourage said husband to pick thin yarn for said sweater.)

And, really, there were plenty of times when I was out and about that I could have been knitting, and just…wasn’t.  I’ve had this pair of socks in my purse for months as well, but I don’t think I’ve knit on them in weeks, easily.

I must be ill.  There’s no other possible explanation.

(I thought I’d posted this from my phone last Thursday, but it turns out that I apparently only saved it.  Damn technology.)

Reading the directions is important.  It’s a life skill that I’ve only had spotty success with, both in knitting and in life.  In knitting, it usually manifests in me going off pattern within the first few inches – and, of course, I usually claim it’s actually on purpose.

In life, this failure to read directions often manifests in a vague sense of where I’m supposed to be and when I’m supposed to get there, without any clear understanding of how I’m going to make that happen or what exactly I’ll do once I get there.

Today, for example, I was really excited to be able to attend Ignite Seattle for the first time.  (Even if you can’t make it to an in-person Ignite, you should totally check out the videos on the site – they cover all kinds of topics, are usually funny, and are always limited to 5 minutes.)  I looked up where I needed to be, I looked up the start time, and I kind of ignored everything else.

Because I knew where and when I needed to be, I rushed over from work to get to the theater at 7.  I didn’t have a plan for dinner, but I figured I could have bar food since the theater had a bar.

First lesson: there’s a difference between liquids and foods, and bars are only guaranteed to have the former.

Once I got into the theater, I found a seat and started wondering when the festivities would start.  And kept wondering, until eventually someone got on the mike and announced that we were going to work on mouse trap-powered cars until 8:30.

I thought for sure that must be a mistake.  Surely he meant 7:30, meaning I’d only have to wait 15 minutes.

Nope, dead serious.  One hour of car building, fifteen minutes of car racing, and then the main event would begin.

Second lesson: when you see random posts about an ice-breaking activity to build mouse trap-powered cars before the talks, don’t assume “ice-breaker” means “quick”.  Apparently, some people are quite passionate about their mouse trap-powered car racing and can’t be rushed in the building thereof.

Luckily, I’ve at least learned enough to always have my go-everywhere, emergency socks with me.

It’s validating to know I can at least plan for emergencies like this.  Now if only I had some food…

So I’ve been working on the pattern for the Garden Party Socks, and I’m at the point that I need to add some pictures of the finished product.  I’ve got a theory that the most famous knitters are currently the ones who produce the best knitting porn.  And I want to be one of the best knitters, so…

Can I just say that I’m so glad that people I know read this blog?  Because there’s no way on earth they’ll tease me for implying that I want to be a knitting porn star.

I’ve apparently also decided I never want to run for public office…

Anyway, it’s become time for me to take a few pictures of the socks.  And I want them to be good pictures, you know, really lush and sexy.  I want the knitters who see them to crave these socks, to go mad with wanting to find yarn and needles right now so they can cast on and find the release of knitting this pattern.

Okay, apparently my mind is stuck on a single track, and it’s not a great one.  Why don’t you just look at my current sock picture while I give my brain a thoughrough scrubbing?

(By the way, those are the new sock blockers that The Blanket Thief gave me for Xmas.  I had an inordinately fun time trying to hang these in various places in my house.)

I’m thinking that the perfect picture for my garden party socks would be a nice spring garden in the late afternoon light, with lush greenness everywhere.  Maybe hanging nonchalantly in a tree with budding leaves, or possibly tucked in amongst a bunch of flowers.

The only problem with that plan is that it’s currently January, and we’re still a couple months away from new growth on the plants.  And I don’t want to wait that long.  I’m impatient.  I demand instant gratification.  I want my sexy knitting porn, and I want it now!

Anyone have any ideas for where I could do a great winter knitting porn photo shoot?

It’s been rather cold here lately, which means that I’ve been reveling in my hand-knit sock collection.  When I was doing laundry the other week (and, er, it had been a while since the last time I’d done laundry…) I was struck by something.

I have a lot of hand-knit socks.  It was 18 pair in the laundry that day – there are more in the total collection, but the rest don’t get to see the light of day that much (mostly because they’re made with cotton, like Sockotta, and thus I find them wildly uncomfortable to walk on).

The other thing I noticed is that I tend to reuse patterns.  I’m not just talking about my standard sock formula (although there’s a few of those in the pile), I’m talking about things like Pomatomus.

What is the plural of Pomatomus, anyway?  Pomatomi?  Pomatomuses?  Regardless, I liked this pattern so much, I knit it three times.  I think the funniest part about that is the designer of Pomatomus, Cookie A, allegedly only knit one of them, and thus found a single mannequin leg to display it with sensationally.  (I say “allegedly” because even though I swear I read about this in both Cookie A’s blog and the Yarn Harlot‘s, I can’t seem to find either entry.  I may have dreamed it up, although I like to think I usually have more exciting dreams than that…)

It’s not just Pomatomuses, though – I’ve got two Hourglasses as well.

I don’t always follow the pattern, as you might notice if you compare the ribbing between the two socks.  The purple is more like the original pattern, while the green sports a k1tbl p1 rib – flows much better into the hourglass pattern, in my opinion.  I love the way these socks fit, though, and they seem to knit up super quick, so I expect I’ll be making a few more of these in my lifetime.

I’ve also got a couple examples of the Garden Party Socks (a.k.a. the sock I’m designing right now).

The top is a made out of a skein of Meilenweit, and frankly is about the worst choice I could have made for the project.  The bottom is Trekking XXL, and embodies everything I love about both the pattern and Trekking.  Trekking tends to make just about everything better.

In somewhat related news, I’ve let the Blanket Thief know that I want sock blockers for Christmas.  If I’m lucky, maybe my sock pictures will improve quite a bit in the new year.

Remember a long time ago when I said I wanted to start writing knitting patterns?  And how I then managed to knit an entire pair of socks without writing down a single letter about how I’d done so?  You know, like almost exactly a year ago?

At least I’m not making the same mistakes again…

So, you see, a few weeks ago I decided that I would write up the Garden Party Socks pattern (as that’s how I’ve decided to name it).  I created a knitting font in order to make the charts, I played around with the formatting in Word way more than a sane person would have (including no small amount of swearing), and I wrote down the pattern as I created the first sock.  I figured I would be my first test knitter, so I (as far as it’s possible for me to do so) followed the pattern when making the second sock.

It seemed like no time at all that I had a pair of socks!  And a pattern to go with them!  Maybe this knitting designer thing would work out after all!

Except, it was when I was thinking about how awesome it would be to be a knitting designer that I realized something…the Chinese lanterns pattern that I’m basing this sock on was written for flat knitting, not knitting in the round.  That means that all the fussy bits are on the even rows, with the odd rows being simple “knit the knits and purl the purls” – but ultimately, that leads to imbalanced lantern tops in relation to lantern bottoms.

I immediately cast on a small section of knitting so I could compare the pattern as written vs the pattern as I think it should be – the two columns on the left are “as I think it should be” and the two on the right are “as written”.

Do you see a difference?  It’s hard to see if you’re not me, and doubly so when it’s in the picture above, but if you look at the bottom of the two lanterns you can kind of see that while the one on the far left is nicely curved the one on the right is a little jerky.

Or, at least, you can tell if you’re me.  The Blanket Thief swears that he cannot see a difference even when I put it two inches from his nose (note to self: he doesn’t really like having knitting two inches from his nose…).

However, it’s my first real pattern, and I want it to be perfect, so I’m fixing up the chart and knitting them again (in different, plain yarn, so you can actually see the pattern – sometimes I do make the same mistake twice).

I think they’re lovely as is, and it’s certainly possible that no one on the planet but me would notice, but I do notice, you know?  Plus, this is an excuse to have yet another pair of socks in my drawer…

Four months ago, I decided to give flap heels a try.  From the get go, I knew I wasn’t going to like the resulting socks – a good part of the reason I decided to try the flap heel on this pair is because I already didn’t like the yarn, so if the heel turned out badly, I wouldn’t mind too much.  And yet, somehow, the reality is worse than I could have imagined.  I now know, without any shadow of a doubt, that I will not ever knit another flap heel.

Why?

Because the damn thing tickles!

I’ve always had super sensitive feet.  I resisted making socks for years because when I tried my first pair (on size 2US/2.75-3mm needles) the purl bumps hurt my feet when I walked on them.  It wasn’t until I tried again on size 0US/2mm needles years later that I finally figured out what all the sock fever was about in the knitting community.  Even on the small needles I’m using, though, I still avoid cotton yarns most of the time due to their stiffness and the way the stitches hold their definition against my feet.

But flap heels!  They have ridges!  On the inside of the foot!  And OH MY GOD DOES IT TICKLE.  I can’t imagine willingly wearing these socks anywhere or for any period of time.

Not, mind you, that I would have anyway – the colors are likewise atrocious.

Luckily, taste being what it is and variable between people, one of my coworkers actually likes the colorway for these socks and her feet are the same size as mine.  It’s win-win: I get the damn things out of my house, and she actually wants to have them for her very own!

As for the yarn – this was another Deborah Norville yarn, and while it didn’t have the ridiculous number of cut ends as the first pair, it still wasn’t entirely enjoyable to knit with – it’s kind of rough on my hands (surprising when the first pair were so soft) and kind of splitty, and frankly it feels cheap (no surprise, given that it was ridiculous cheap when I bought it – we’re talking $5/pair of socks cheap).

So it looks like Deborah still gets one more chance with the last colorway of hers I have in my stash (eventually – I want a break with some nice Tofutsies before I go back to Deborah) before I pass final judgment on her entire yarn line.

As for the flap heel – no more chances.  One pair of tickle-y socks is enough.

This last weekend, for the first time in my life, I had the overwhelming urge to knit a flap heel.  On every other sock I’ve ever knitted, I’ve done an 
Auto Heel - it was the first heel I ever learned how to do, and it’s the only heel I’ve done since.

And yet, when I got to the point that I was ready to add a heel onto the go-everywhere socks I’m knitting, my first instict was: “I should use this pair of socks to try out a flap heel.”

I think it’s because I’m finding that I actually really don’t like these socks.  Mostly it’s the colors – and what’s driving me nuts, of all things, is the green.  Those who know me will blink a bit when they read that, because green is by far my favorite color, and yet when used in this sock, I hate it. I think it has too much brown mixed in or something.

Poor flap heel – given that I’m predisposed to not liking these socks already, the chances the experience of the heel will convert me away from the Auto Heel are small.

Then again, when you’ve already learned the best way for you to do something, why change?