Category Archives: Socks

FO: Gemelli Socks, and a Year in Review

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I never really think about knitting Christmas presents for people. I can’t be that organized and I can’t bear the degree of disappointment I would feel if I failed. So I only really knitted one Christmas gift this year, and it was always on the cards.

I am unashamedly a Rock+Purl fangirl, and that’s very much helped by the fact that Ruth is one of my favourite people in the whole world. When she brought out this pattern, I a) knew I wanted to knit it, b) knew it deserved to be made with a touch of luxury, and c) knew who it would be for.

Claire, my personal trainer, has looked after me for over two years now. We kicked off in June 2010, after I decided that I’d had enough of my family telling me how ‘big’ I’d got, and she whipped me into shape. Over time, she didn’t just train me: she listened to me, helped me with my confidence issues, and re-introduced me to the wonders of yoga. We discovered together that yoga was incredible for depression, just absolutely eye-opening in terms of what it did and how it helped. At least, it was for me, and I would whole-heartedly recommend it for anyone seeking other options in dealing with depression.

When I have a bad day, I curl up. I hunker down and hide and wait for it all to pass over and then slowly unfold and creakingly come back out. With yoga, all that stretching, all those big, wide movements, all the dynamism of the human body helps me unfurl, become tall again and take charge of my space.

Claire deserves a good pair of luxurious knitted socks. She squeed when she opened her little parcel, declaring, “Oooh! Yoga socks!” as if she completely understood me as a knitter. I told her I thought of her sitting on her mat, at home, meditating, her feet toasty warm. And that made her incredibly happy.

Pattern: Gemelli Socks, by Ruth Garcia-Alcantud
Yarn: The Knitting Goddess 4-ply Luxury Sock Yarn, in Semi-solid Heathers
Needles: 2.75mm

I realized that I didn’t do too badly this year, knitting-wise, with 10 finished objects. I hope to finish a couple more before the New Year, which would be great if I did because that would mean I have an average of one finished object a month this year. But a lot of other things happened, too.

I bought a guitar and had my first guitar lessons. I hope to have more in the New Year.

I finished my RHS course at Hadlow College.

Technically, this means I am allowed to run free in other people’s gardens and work in them. I’m still not so sure. I mean, I wouldn’t let me. But I joined the WFGA, and am now on their WRAGS traineeship scheme, so hopefully in the New Year something will come along and I will have my first paid work in horticulture, which is what it’s all about. Meanwhile I’ll return to volunteering at the Horniman Museum and Gardens in January and learn my trade there, as well as go to a few short courses with the WFGA.

I also got to go to an event at the Paralympics in London.

Which was a treat and a half, as not only did I get to visit the Olympic Park and watch Team GB take a silver medal in swimming, but I got to spend the day with the very lovely Michaela, who provided the spare ticket.

We had a spectacular night. I’d gone partially deaf and hoarse from the cheering, and the sky was clear and warm and perfect for these photos.

I got over my fear of my sewing machine and made a quilt of my very own. All by myself.

And on a more frivolous note, I decided that twenty-odd years was enough and I was going to quit biting my fingernails. That was in August.

This is what they look like now. I am slightly guilt-ridden by the fact that despite all those years of constant biting and tearing and abuse, my nails have grown very hard – I couldn’t bite them now even if I tried – and without any evidence of ridging, weakness or blemish. They’re pink (when not painted) and healthy and as I’ve discovered via many accidents, can do serious damage without damaging themselves.

(That, by the way, is my second-favourite ever nail polish, Jessica in Nutter Butter. My favourite is Zoya in Bailey, but I have acquired a small collection of random fun colours. For whatever reason, metallic is my thing. Also a bit of glam glitter doesn’t hurt.) 

And all throughout is my new camera, my fantastic, beautiful Berenice. She is responsible for all the above photos, and all but a handful since August. I love her. Every time I take a photo with her and I look at it on her screen in those seconds after the click, I hear myself saying, “Oh you little beauty.”

I don’t really know what to expect next year. I haven’t really thought of the bigger things. Little things, yes. I’ve booked in for an 8-week swimming course to improve my strength and coordination in swimming, and while the winter winds are up I’m hopefully going to get on to a few powerkite-flying courses. I start a diploma in Garden History, Philosophy and Design in February, as a taster to find out if garden design is what I really want to do.

For what to me are little things, they’re things that are slowly going to end up defining me. When I dream about my future self, she’s drawing sketches in the morning before going out to tend to a client or two’s gardens, hopefully interrupted by an offering of a mug of tea, perhaps a slice of cake if she’s lucky. And then when the winds are good, she’d get her gear, drive to a bit of coast and unfurl the powerkite and board.

I think all I want next year, is to be able to answer the question of, “So what do you do?” with this:

I’m a gardener. I kite-surf at the weekends.

It’s not a lot to ask.

FO: Boot Socks, aka One of Nine

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Sometimes, it’s the simple things in life that are quite very nice.

A ball of discounted 6-ply sportweight self-striping sock yarn, and a simple toe-up sock recipe gave me many hours of mindless knitting joy. Normally I’m really bad at plain knitting. I actually get bored. I want a pattern to work with so I can chase repeats, actually feel some progress. It’s so much easier to see how many repeats you’ve knitted than how many inches.

But a self-striping yarn is different. I get to chase the colour changes. And then when I get to the second one, my OCD tendencies leave me checking every few rows to see if they’re matching up nicely.

(These sort of do. You’d have to be staring at my feet to notice where they’re not quite identical).

Because it’s a thick yarn with 25% nylon, these are going to wear like demons. Perfect to go with my new Doc Marten boots. I could have made them taller, though, had I considered making increases as I went up the leg before starting the ribbing, so I’m keeping that in mind for the next pair.

The only modification I did was to do a Turkish cast-on for the toe, if only because I felt the shape of the toe that way fitted my feet better. Using Judy’s Magic Cast-On tends to give me a squarer result, while increasing in intervals with a Turkish cast-on gave a rounder look and fit.

Pattern: David’s Toe-Up Sock Cookbook, by David Schulz (Ravelry link)
Yarn: Regia World College Colour in Campus
Needles: 3.0mm

Because this yarn was discounted when I bought it, I ended up with all nine colourways. Which can only mean one thing.

Yup. Boot Socks Two of Nine are go.

In Preparation

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Every other year now Nick and I go and do the tour of duty back to Malaysia. We’re off soon for two weeks, and I’ve had to get stuff ready.

Apart from making sure that the flat is in order and we have enough laundry and haven’t forgotten anything, there are a couple of things that are unique to the Irish household preparations.

Thanks to our Kindles, both Nick and I are properly armed with enough reading. Once upon a time we’d have a backpack stuffed with paperbacks. No more. I think for once Nick might actually not run out of things to read on this trip. I’m slower, so I’m in no real danger.

Also, I’ve had to prepare knitting.

I finished a baby blanket for a nephew that arrived nearly 6 months ago. It’s Rowan Fine Milk Cotton, which is not my ideal choice, but as this child lives in a tropical country, I had to do the right thing and get knitting with cotton. It’s a lovely fabric, though, and will wash well in the machine.

I’ve started a plain stocking stitch sock in a nice, 6-ply sportweight yarn. This is Regia World College Color in Campus; there was an offer on this yarn, and I now own a ball of each colour in the College series. That’s nine pairs of nice plain boot socks. Nine.

And I’ve prepared a nice picot cuff for another more brain-worthy sock pattern. This is the first package from this year’s Knit Love Club, and I fully intend to knit all six of the patterns this year. I may fail spectacularly.

There’s no round-up for March, as the reading and film-viewing has been a little thin this month, but with all the travelling, I’m sure I’ll have stuff to write about for next month’s round-up. That is, if I ever work out where to start.

I’ll be back in a couple of weeks, with hopefully plenty to show.

Fruity FOs: Boysenberry Yo & Rambutan

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When the amazing Cookie A announced that she was going to run a sock club back in 2010, I couldn’t resist. Club members would get two sock patterns per instalment –  one simple pattern, the other more challenging in the style of Cookie A – to go with our one skein of yarn and two cookie recipes.

Me being the easily-distracted, slow knitter that I am, I have only so far managed two of last year’s twelve pairs, and bizarrely enough both of them are fruit-themed.

Pattern: Boysenberry Yo, by Cookie A (April 2011 instalment)
Yarn: Dream in Color Smooshy in Visual Purple
Needles: 2.5mm

I actually finished these last August, and I’ve worn them a couple of times already, but I kept missing opportunities to photograph them. I finally got around to it yesterday when the sun was out.

The lovely thing about these socks is that this was the yarn I took along to my first ever Cookie A workshop, way back in 2009. I remember choosing it because I knew it would stand up to repeated ripping back, but I never designed anything with it in the end, and it sat in my stash for a while.

Getting two patterns per instalment is a great thing because it means you can use the club yarn for one pattern and something from the stash for the other. That was what I did with this. I thought it appropriate, given that despite the fact that I’ve been a Cookie A fan since I began knitting, this is the first time I’ve knitted one of her designs.

I know. Shameful in so many ways from so many directions.

This was a great pattern to knit. I knit most of one sock on a train journey; the pattern had such a nice simple rhythm to it and it was almost effortless.

Much more recently, I finished these:

Pattern: Rambutan Socks, by Cookie A (December 2011 instalment)
Yarn: Socktopus Sokkusu Original in Princess and the Pea
Needles: 2.5mm

This was the yarn Ling gave me to knit a sample with. I dithered about for ages trying to choose a pattern, and finally decided that the colours of this yarn reminded me of slightly under-ripe rambutan, so I figured it was destiny.

(Also, I love rambutan. It’s one of my favourite fruit, and it reminds me of a dear late uncle of mine, who had his own tree, and if you saw his car coming up the road to the house, you know he’s got bunches of it in tow.)

This was a quick knit, for me. Under four weeks for the pair. As there was a right and left sock, it definitely killed any notion of Second Sock Syndrome, not that I really suffer from it. This was lovely to knit, and the yarn, of course, is beautiful. I fear I might become quite addicted to Sokkusu Original.

It did occur to me, later on, that I might have had the socks on the wrong feet. The pattern is meant to swerve towards the outside of the foot, rather than the inside. But they still look good, right?

I’m kind of sad that I won’t be able to keep these, but I enjoyed knitting them so much that I’m glad to be adding to Alice and Ling’s samples. This design just shows off the colours so well, the ladies should be very pleased with their work.

And what am I knitting now?

Yup. More socks.

FO: Sinuous

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Last finished object for a while, unfortunately. But there will be more to come, I’m sure.

This is Sinuous.

This is, as I am always eager to point out, a pattern by the very talented, very funny and very lovely Ruth Garcia-Alcantud, she of RockandPurl. I urge you to visit her website, not only because she is a clever designer, but also a clever teacher, and she has fantastic tutorials with lots of photos on beading, seaming and, as I previously mentioned, blocking.

Seriously, go. I’ll be right here when you get back. Don’t worry; I know you may be a while.

Right, hello again! Now then, to these socks.

There is a lot to like about them. I love patterns that ‘click’ very early on, the kind where you get the hang of and then you rarely – if ever – have to check the pattern again. It makes this real on-the-go knitting, fearless in not needing the pattern with you all the time.

Snaking twisted stitches get pulled left and right by the decreases and yarn-overs, constantly making me wonder how on earth that column of twisted stitches is moving of its own accord. It isn’t, of course, but the simple knitting you do makes it look that way.

And the snaking continues along the side of the foot, which is elegant and thoughtful. This is the best element of sock knitting: when the pattern isn’t just something that’s slapped onto a sock-shaped template. When it’s crafted, thought about, considered. It’s not about cut-and-paste; it should be like architecture. It should be like constructing a building, but one of great beauty and functionality.

(Have I been watching and reading Grand Designs lately? Does it show? Crap.)

See how the pattern goes all the way to my toes? That bit made me crazy, but I wanted to do it. It meant keeping track of the toe decreases while managing the increases and decreases within the pattern itself, which involved degrees of fudging – if it’s the sort of thing that drives you crazy, you won’t want to know that these socks are not identical; oh no – but the effect is so damned worth it.

I’m not gushing just because Ruth is a dear friend of mine and I love extolling all her various virtues. It really is something I love about design. Ruth and I both attended a sock design workshop with Cookie A a couple of years ago, and this principle of design is a huge thing with Cookie. That lines should flow, that patterns can move and continue, that complex things can be constructed simply. I sadly never managed to design my own socks after that workshop, but I’d hazard a guess that it gave Ruth lots of jumping-off points for her own ideas.

So, Ruth, if you’re reading this… a wee hint from a friend: please design more socks. Please.

Pattern: Sinuous, by Ruth Garcia-Alcantud (www.rockandpurl.com)
Yarn: Artist’s Palette Yarns Smoothie Sock
Needles: 2.75mm for the leg, 2.5mm for the heel onwards

FO: Hopscotch Socks

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Oh yeah. I’m really bringing them on. And this isn’t the last FO you’ll see this week. Oh no.

(Not that I’m actually knitting like a demon. It’s just that it took me forever to get around to taking photos of my finished knitting. Which is silly, really.)

Long, long ago, but not quite in a galaxy far, far away, there was the Socktopus Sock Club, which began in Christmas 2007. Alice was as ever, the genius behind the idea that has carried on till presently – the club since 2010 renamed the Knit Love Club – where now she not only designs all the socks, but also dyes the yarn.

I was a member of the sock club from its inception, and now I get the pattern-only membership as – let’s face it – I’ve got plenty of yarn. But as I mentioned before, me being me, I’m a really slow knitter. That, or I’m easily distracted.

But this is a pattern from the first and original sock club, the fifth installation of the club in 2008.

Pattern: Hopscotch Socks, by Anna Bell
Yarn: Brooklyn Handspun Soft Spun Plus in Toadstool
Needles: 2.5mm

I shied away from toe-up socks for a while because despite the fact that I have quite small feet, my past history (former sprinter) and natural build (stocky Far East Asian) mean that I have quite chunky calves. I’ve long solved this problem for cuff-down socks as I know about three very stretchy cast-ons, but I hadn’t yet learned a cast-off that would be stretchy enough.

Enter Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-Off.

Which is stretchy. Well, it says so on the tin. It’s stretchiness is certainly comparable to the German twisted cast-on for cuff-down socks, which my lovely and clever friend Ruth swears by, which I have since learned and loved.

These socks are a little bit magic. They don’t look like much when they’re off your feet, but put them on and these gorgeous little cables appear, yawning wide like rising stones. The idea of the pattern was that the cables ‘hopped’ to and fro, here to there, and in doing so form these dented pebbles on my feet.

I like them. I like them a lot.

The yarn, though, I have spent some time making peace with.

It’s odd, but so far when I’ve had to go home to Malaysia for a visit, it’s a Brooklyn Handspun yarn that I’m taking along with me, to knit on the plane using bamboo needles.

(I know it’s no longer an issue, but at the time it just made more sense and meant less headache that I took aboard bamboo needles instead of metal. I have now confirmed, repeatedly, that metal ones would’ve been okay.)

Now, I don’t know if it’s the trip to Malaysia, or the bamboo needles, or the yarn, but every single time, it’s absolute disaster. Every single time, the pattern and the yarn get put away for a time until I can face it again. It could really be something as simple as me being incompetent.

But these worked out well in the end. They’re squishy, they’re fun, and they fit really well, which is always the best thing. And even better, I’m now less put off by toe-up socks thanks to this awesome super-springy cast-off. I’m just sorry it took me so long to get these made.