In Which I Unwittingly Convince You of My Insanity

Oh Lord. There I was all sock-hateful and then something happened.

It might have been the (fortuitous, apparently) 2mm needle breaking - which liberated me to move to a 2.25mm needle. It might have been the moment when I actually stopped caring and gained a rhythm. No doubt it had everything to do with your chorus of comments - each of which gave me key information in moving forward.

Sock 1 took 20 hrs. Sock 2 took 10.

Here's the result:

Yeah, they're really blue...

Yeah, I realize these are not the best socks in the world. They don't have the smoothest stitch, the yarn (I now know) is suboptimal for socks; it's too spongy. I don't much like the pattern.

But my kid took one look at these and it was like someone gave her a puppy for Christmas. OMG - she LOVED them. I made her an entire freakin' sweater and I got a respectful thanks. These socks, I sense she would have cut me for them. What with my not liking them particularly, it was a win-win. :-)

Then it occurred to me that if I'd never made another sweater simply cuz I didn't like the pattern, outcome and process (each of which has occurred at times) then I'd never have got anywhere!

So, grudgingly, here's to the merits of socks:

• What appeals so much - I suspect - to so many people is the formulaic nature of sock-knitting. Don't get me wrong. You can make super-complex socks in zillions of ways. But once you've cracked a code, you can make them again and again and again and again with nary a second thought. My own disastrous first sock experience followed by a relatively smooth second sock experience proves that point - and I've only ever made one pair.

• They really are much beloved. You sock-makers are like a cult! :-) And you've somehow inculcated my kid! There's got to be something to these "handmade socks". I owe it to generations of wonderful sock knitters - and my excellent commenters - to investigate further.

• Can't get more practical than a pair of socks, no? And I am a pragmatic woman, after all...

• Apparently - and I can't defend this yet - they last way long and keep you toasty warm.

Moreover, here are some things my excellent readers have recently taught me:

• The best sock yarn is 75% wool and 25% nylon.

• 10 stitches per inch (horizontal gauge) will knit an optimally strong fabric, though anything above 8 stitches per inch is fairly strong.

• Regia is a very respected sock yarn brand, from Germany. It's not exciting, particularly, but it makes the most durable yarn and the first-wave knitters really appreciate it for that reason.

• Plain is good. I mean, if ribbing seems too showy, maybe I've got off lucky. Cuz stockinette socks are much easier to knit than crazy patterns. That's ok.

• Variegation (and patterns) keep the project interesting. I want to say they're the only thing that keeps it interesting, but I don't want to incite mutiny! I suspect, if I get to watch some kind of colour-work emerge, I'll be more excited to go from beginning to end. And, who knows, under boots I may just wear them even if they're not black!

Which is why, crazy-compulsion style, I went out and got new yarn and needles.

Here's a (somewhat wan) pic of the yarn, which is actually pretty snappy in that crazy variegated way I don't understand:

Photo source: Mariannes Wolle

The new needles are another set 2.25mms - this time pointy Addis. I know that some say one should avoid metal with socks and magic loop at all costs (Katy I hear you), but I worked the other pair on bamboo and, with the gauge of the needle paired with the loop, I just found it all too much effort to go from one stitch to the next. I think I need the slip to get a groove. Which, let's face it, is the primary thing that makes the process of knitting fun. We're about to see...

I don't want you to think I'm a sock convert. This may well be the last pair I ever knit. But at least I'll have given it the college try.

So, what do you think of my new stance? Am I seemingly schizophrenic, what with the sock hate and then the sock acceptance? Do you think the new yarn is utterly hideous - no leading questions here, the photo really isn't flattering. Let's talk!

Socked In

So, I'm sick with a cold and I'm making a sock. Exciting times here, really.

Actually, it's frustrated times. Frustration is the watchword of the last few days. Having difficulty sleeping, last night I was amazed to wake from a dream that was entirely about anger. I can't remember the substance of this dream, but OMG, I was out-of-control, steerage-class-plane-passenger-during-a-4-hr-runway-delay, deliriously angry. Have you ever woken from a dream enraged?? Till last night, I don't suppose I have.

I can't say if it's this anxiety-provoking bug*, which has effectively torched my holiday enriched my opportunity to rest... I don't know if it's the sock (a fast-tracked 2013 goal vis a vis this challenge**), which has managed to fuck up in just about more ways than any other project I've ever undertaken... I mean, it's snowy outside. I should just be grateful to have an excuse to sit on my ass and knit a sock.

Allow me to tell it like it is:

Here's a tiny little piece of the sock:

A Nice Ribbed Sock by Glenna C. It may be ribbed, but it ain't nice!

• For starters, who makes a sock in royal blue?? Seriously. I only ever wear black socks. The shop had this same, very nice (if somewhat sheeny) merino-silk blend in black. Why didn't I just make a black sock? That, I might get some use from! The yarn has a lot of spring and strength (imparted by the silk). You know I ordinarily don't like silk yarn in any amount, but I was looking for strength.

• I will never darn a sock. So how is it that I'm making a thing that's gonna need to be darned, or discarded, in some period of time (and probably sooner rather than later the way we walk around here)?? My choices will be, presuming I don't just burn these things on completion, a) wearing and breaking them (and wastefully throwing them out, which might be hard to do) or b) never wearing them and keeping them in a drawer doing nothing (also hard to do and wasteful). Socks, they really give you all the options.

• Those of you debating whether to knit socks or a sweater: Please be aware that you can knit a pair of simple socks in about half the time it will take you to knit a simple sweater. I don't know about you, but I'll go with the sweater - which people will actually SEE when I put it on. And which won't rip in the toe. Note: I've never had a pair of socks that didn't eventually die in this way, so I'm sensitive. I have no actual indication that my hand knit socks will go at the toe. Specifically if I don't use them.

• And a tiny bit about specifics: Magic loop may not be the best way to make all socks, especially if your needles are a US 0 (2mm). Admittedly, I'm a total newbie with this degree of magic loop - small-diameter knitting though, I've done quite a lot of in the past. However, I've never managed to pull out half the needle, exposing mini, microscopic live stitches (taking forever to replace on the needle and then leaving an unsightly tension-change ridge) quite so many times or in so many ways. 

• A propos of tension-change ridges, I used such a crappy needle (one a new LYS sells and which I'll never purchase again!) that it's actually snapped while I was in the middle of a row! I was not knitting hard, peeps! The needle, so sharp at the point that I couldn't actually push on it without it hurting, routinely split the rather pliant yarn. How many badnesses can I expect to block out? Really. Cuz now I'm using a slightly larger needle to complete the project (2.25 mm). On the plus side, the new needle (also that terrible brand) seems to be handling things much more naturally and without any tension differentiation. I did think to myself, when I swatched, that the 2.25mm felt better than the 2mm. I guess I should have listened to my gut.

• The sock leg is going to be too big, I'm pretty sure, esp. after a wearing. I should have cut an inch out of the pattern (8 stitches) but I really didn't know how much negative ease a sock requires till I started making one. (This is a reasonable learning curve experience I can't take umbrage with.)

• This pattern isn't designed to be made up with magic loop, so I had to go online and learn how to make a sock with magic loop and then tailor my pattern to the method. I suggest, if you don't want to use DPNs, and I don't, that you start with a sock pattern devised for magic loop in the first place. It'll save you some time and energy. Having said this, I'm glad I figured out the magic loop version because the idea of carrying around 4 or 5 needles to make a little circle seems ridiculous to me!

Alas, I'm going to have to finish the first sock, make up its partner and then make up another pair (or 2) until I get it right. I may not like making socks but I'm going to figure it out and become proficient. Then, when people talk about the activity, I can be as obnoxious as I want with the benefit of experience.

So, knitters, come clean. If you hate making socks, you can share your true feelings here! Tell us about it.  And, those of you who don't knit, what's the core knitting project of your imagination? What's the thing you would want to make if you did knit? Is it socks???

* I should clarify that, even though I caught this bug hard - as you'd expect given that I'm still recovering, in muted ways, from pertussis - I can breathe (if not through my nose). I'm coughing a lot more than Scott and M did when they had this thing before Xmas and, I sense, I feel worse than I would, ordinarily, with a cold (though I'm a misery when I have a cold), but this is a totally different scene. It would great to recover in the next 90 minutes by Monday, when I have to go back to work, so that at least I will know that, once again, I can get a regular virus and overcome it in a standard amount of time. Weird, when catching a cold can corroborate one's health improvement.

** I have come to realize, in my 40s, that I'm actually quite competitive in some ways and I love a test! Gillian, apparently, has my number.