I finally finished the sixth pair of socks last evening. Done. Completed.
A friend asked to make 6 pairs of socks for her daughter and granddaughter for Christmas sometime in June (July, August, September, October, November, December – 6 months) – enough time to make 6 pairs of socks.
But the “job” felt like it was taking over my life. This wasn’t relaxed knitting. I felt compelled to knit at least 20 rows every evening, if I was to meet this deadline. I have knit a pair of socks in 2 weeks, but that was because the TV program I was watching was particularly interesting, or my knitting stamina was better at that particular time. While relaxed knitting it probably takes me closer to 3 weeks, maybe even 4 – although I knit most evenings, some evenings I might not.
Even though I actually had enough time, I felt the pressure. It was a relief, last evening, to finish the toe on the final sock!
Now I can return to the socks I put aside when I started these 6 pairs.
I finished this pair a couple of nights ago (4th of October, I think). I immediately started the final, 6th, pair. That means I should be finished all six pairs of Christmas socks for my friend’s order by the end of October.
It will be a relief.
Although I usually knit for a couple of hours almost every evening, knitting on these socks has been working under pressure and has made it harder than usual. I have often felt I can’t put them down, I need to knit a few more rows, I have to keep going…
I’ve enjoyed the yarns. Because these socks are a tad smaller than my usual women’s size 7 1/2-8 socks they’ve gone a bit faster. But that hasn’t mattered. I’ve felt the pressure, nevertheless.
I’m looking forward to getting back to knitting when I feel like it, and not knitting when I don’t!
(As the Monty Python gang used to say “And now for something completely different!)
I’m working away at those six pairs of socks I agreed to knit for a friend for her daughter and granddaughter for Christmas. I will make the deadline – two pair left – three weeks/pair. I’m hoping to be finished by the end of October/first week of November!
I’ve already started pair #5 – in green.
My only concern is whether the foot is long enough – if it isn’t – I’m going to have six pairs of socks with feet I’ll have to lengthen by around 4-5 rows.
(I’ve started thinking about how to do that – like by cutting the foot open, adding the rows to the foot, then reattaching the toe end using a Kitchener stitch! It would be less work than unravelling the toe, knitting the extra rows, and reuniting the toe!)
Well these socks turned out well. The peach solid blended nicely with the peach in the variegated yearn and the other colours are bright and serve as accents for the main colour. And believe it or not, there was exactly enough of the peach solid to finish the second toe. I was prepared to add some mauve, orange and yellow to the toe if I had to. That meant I would have to undo the toe in the first sock so I could match what I did with the second sock. But none of that was necessary – there was enough peach solid to do the job.
Leftovers for next pair of socks
There’s enough yarn left in the ball to make a pair of legs, for sure. I’ve added a mauve solid for cuffs, heels and toes. I have a second variegated yarn that I’m going to interleave with the peach variegated which will give me more than enough for a full pair of socks. The socks I want to make are a slightly smaller size for a friend who wears a size six shoe. Plenty of yarn here.
To prep for the socks, my next step is to divide both variegated yarns exactly in half so I know how much I have for one sock (and be assured there will be the same amount available for the second sock)! Now, to divide the yarn and get going!
Finished these socks last week. Good colours, zippy patterning. They took a bit longer than usual – I didn’t knit my usual 20-30 rows each evening – maybe because I wasn’t feeling like knitting. Anyway, they’re done and added to the sock stash.
I started a new pair – can’t leave the needles empty but that knitting has been interrupted with Danish Paper Stars.
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Adding the PointsFolding CompletedFinished, Trimmed Star
I’ve been handing out Danish Stars to neighbours and friends for the past six years. Everybody knows where they come from when they find them on their door handle. Some have become so bold as to ask whether I’ll be making more this year. No way out of it – I had to make another batch of paper stars.
I started by cutting the 1/2″ strips of legal paper and began making stars. Two evenings of paper folding and I have 18 stars. I will need at least 40 (more likely 50) before I’ve finished. I’ve used up the paper I prepared; I need to cut more paper today. The knitting is suffering – I’ve had to put it aside to make time for star construction!
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My sister Barb called me on Sunday evening to sing me a verse to a song wondering whether I remembered it and might know where it came from. Sounded like a Disney song from something like Snow White – except it wasn’t. Two hours of searching with Google and ChatGPT returned nothing. Usually if I ask Google for lyrics using the bits I remember a song turns up. Not this time. I finally gave up.
The next evening however it dawned on my it might be a song from our childhood, one we learned in school. When I was in 5th grade (1953) the woman in charge of music for the city schools recruited a group of girls from our class to sing some songs from the songbook being used in the schools at that time:
I was one of that select group and I still have that vinyl recording! A very long time ago I managed to have the record digitized so I have the 22 song tracks on my computer. Didn’t I find the song there in the first group of four songs!
Going To The Fair
The birds are singing, the bells are ringing There’s music in all the air, heigh ho As altogether in golden weather we merrily go to the fair, heigh ho!
We have no money for ribbons bonny, Our clothes are the worse for wear But little it matters in silk or in tatters We merrily go to the fair.
The lads and lasses, the time it passes ????????? [There’s fun to be had everywhere], heigh ho As altogether in golden weather we merrily go to the fair, heigh ho!
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There’s that one line I can’t make out on the recording – it has to be something like the lyrics I’ve guessed.
I called Barb to tell her I’d found the song – I still can’t find the lyrics anywhere online although I know the song must be in the “unison” High Road of Song Book One for elementary grades.
I learned that song 71 years ago! Imagine still remembering it.
I’m working away at my yarn stash – these yarns are turning out interesting socks. I like how the golden pair has dark accents. The long repeat on the blue sock creates an interesting colour flow.
The blue sock was a surprise! I knit the contrasting cuff from a 4-ply yarn in my stash – that’s all I ever use. However, I’d bought the blue yarn at Woolworks in Mahone Bay not realizing it (and the three other balls I had picked up) were a 6-ply! When I started knitting the leg the yarn felt funny…heavy in my hand, uncomfortable. I’d probably knit close to 20 rows before I thought to look at the label – only to discover I was working with 6-ply yarn. I had three choices: unravel what I’d done and substitute a different 4-ply, change my needles to a larger size (needing to unravel what I’d done and work with a different number of stitches), or keep knitting the socks. I decided to keep knitting.
As it is, the cuff, heel and toe are knit from 4-ply; the rest of the sock is 6-ply. I’m confident that whoever gets these socks won’t ever notice the difference. What surprised me was how different the heavier yarn felt in my hands. I didn’t like it. And of course, using the smaller 2.5mm needles I’ve used to knit at least 100 pair of socks made the sock more dense than if I’d knit using 3.0mm needles. The problem with the larger needles is having to use fewer stitches if I wanted the socks to turn out the same size – the number of rows would also be different – everything was an unknown. I kept working with my 2.5mm needles.
I knit almost every evening for relaxation – the sock production is a by-product but not my primary motivation. I find my mind slows down when I’m knitting in front of the TV. My attention isn’t on the screen entirely and at the end of the evening I’ve another 20-30 rows completed – I’m not wasting my time but I’m also not rushing to finish the socks – I’m just relaxing!
I returned the other three balls of 6-ply yarn even though they each had a lovely colour scheme. I exchanged them for 4-ply balls. I didn’t like the colours as they appeared in the ball but I’m discovering they’re knitting into interesting socks! I’ve one sock completed, the second half done – a pattern I didn’t expect emerged. It was challenging finding a starting place to match the first sock but I succeeded in the end. I will end up with a pair of matched socks from this new ball of yarn.
I picked up this ball of yarn at Fabricville. I don’t usually buy yarn there because they’ve mainly sold Kroy and I find it too heavy to knit comfortably and I don’t like the weight of the socks. However, a couple of months ago I noticed they’d stocked a much nicer sock yarn, lighter, softer, so I bought this ball.
The socks turned out nicely. Somebody will enjoy wearing them!
Then this past week I decided to make a new sunhat for myself. My friend Deb was giving a class on the Closet Core Sunhat. It’s a free pattern with instructions and a tutorial. I traced a copy of her size 22 hat, bought some fabric, then got to work. Deb had done some prep work on the pattern – reducing the 5/8″ seam allowance to 3/8″ which made sewing the seams much easier (next time I make it, I’ll reduce the seams to 1/4″).
InsideOutside
This isn’t my first sunhat. I wanted a reversible hat – one that I could wear on either side. I didn’t follow the instructions. What I did, instead, was to make an outside hat, and an inside hat, then fit them together with the open edge the edge of the brim. I thought about finishing that raw edge with a binding, but instead used a bunch of small squares I had leftover from some previous sunhats (the colours blended/contrasted with the colours in the fabrics I used). I did some heavy free-motion sewing around the edge, securing the squares, using variegated Sulky thread both top and bottom. To finish the hat, I sewed a spiral, using my presser foot as guide, starting from where the brim attaches to the crown to meet the trim at the brim edge.
What makes this hat work as well as it does is the interfacing! I interfaced both the inside and outside hats with a stiff interfacing I normally use for the front placket of a shirt. That was a bit of overkill – I probably could have just done the outside hat and not the inside hat (that’s what I’ll do when I make the hat for my niece – at least until I see whether it makes the crown stiff enough or not). I also included a heavyweight fusible interfacing in the brim which has made it very stiff which I’m most happy with.
I finished this pair last evening after having done absolutely NO knitting for six days. I came down with a norovirus a week ago – vomiting, diarrhea – which lasted four days and then I was too lethargic to do anything but binge watch a TV series on Britbox – Waking The Dead. I finally picked up the sock again (the second sock just needed a toe), finished it, then put stitches on for a new pair.
That’s how it goes – no empty needles in my apartment. Otherwise, how would I rationalize evenings watching TV? I can knit through just about any genre, except tennis! I can’t keep track of the shots and miss the best rallies if I don’t keep my eyes on the screen. I was delighted Sinner defeated Djokovic in the Autralian Open semi-final and then went on to win the tournament Sunday. It’ll be very interesting tennis over the next few years with Sinner and Alcaraz competing – they’re both such young, yet wonderful athletes. Great variety to their games (not just slugging it out from the baseline – no fun watching that). I’m looking forward to the unfolding tennis season this year – lots of great matches to come.
Back to the socks, I realized after the first sock I was probably going to put this pair in my sock drawer. Now that they’re finished, that’s where they’re going. I was even going to put them on this morning but didn’t because they’d have been too loose inside my boots. In the end I haven’t gone out in the storm, I worked on the current quilt (more on that in the next post).
I finished these socks last evening. A nice yarn to work with.
The pink was on the outside of the ball which meant I’d never get to the second pink stripe for a size 7-8 sock! So I rewound the ball in order to have both pink stripes come through.
I enjoyed knitting with this yarn even though the transitions were so subtle. It was difficult finding the matching location – the ball label said the yarn would make two matching socks – the manufacturer just forgot to mark the begin/end in the centre of the ball. It took a bit of careful study to find a similar location for starting the second sock. I didn’t do too badly – the match is almost perfect.
These socks are in the gift pile at the moment – they may make it to my sock drawer….
Remember, I described the challenge of working with this yarn? How the sections of colour were too long so the transitions were not going to allow me to finish with a blue toe. That I had to cut out segments of the various greens to finally reach the blue.
The difficulty was trying to judge the transition segments so the colour demarkations were more blended. I didn’t succeed entirely, I was better with the sock on top – the first one, I think, than with the second. However, the recipient of these socks won’t notice any difference – I’m just being an obsessive perfectionist! The important part of the sock is the leg, anyway. Nobody sees the foot inside the shoe.
The next pair I’ve got underway is definitely BORING – an alternating pattern of magenta, brown, beige, pink stripes.
I haven’t reached the end of the first repeat which seems to involve at least 10 stripes – I’m trying to decide what I can do to liven up the colour palette. This is one of the Hobbii “Silly Socks” balls of yarn I ordered a couple of months ago – I’m not sure what I have in the “leftovers” collection that might intersperse with this to make it more interesting – but I want to do something!
jmn 