The Start of My Sock Journey

My Mum knitted socks since her teens, when she, like so many others, knitted socks for the soldiers in World War 2.  When striped bobby socks were all the rage in my teens, I had hand knitted ones, as well as nice thick fair isle socks that were so lovely and toasty warm.  As the craze for knitting socks started up in more recent times, Mum once again got out her needles and joined in, providing both Mick and I with some lovely socks.

Some years ago I bought this ball of wool with the intention of having a go at knitting some socks myself, but never got around to it.    It is a blend of wool, bamboo and polyamide.  Finally, the time has come.

Knitting socks was one of those things that I was going to have Mum teach me…..one day… but sadly that day has now passed.  Thank goodness for YouTube tutorials.

After watching a few tutorials I learned that you can knit socks the traditional way using double pointed needles (DPNs), a long circular needle with the “magic loop” method or with a teeny weeny nine inch circular needle.  I felt that I would end up in a tangle with either DPNs or magic loop, so have opted for a  nine inch circular.  They aren’t all that available, so I bought one online.  

It arrived last Tuesday and is a 2.25mm ChiaoGoo, which coincidentally is the same as used in the tutorials.  After I had ordered it, I came across another YouTube video doing a product comparison and happily, this brand came out on top.  Yay!

I chose a tutorial by the Crazy Sock Lady for Vanilla Socks on 9” Circular. The pattern is purchased through Ravelry.  Her tutorial is really easy to follow.

First, I did a little tension swatch.  It is supposed to be about 8 stitches to the inch.  Mine is 9.  I hoped that in the actual project I may be knitting a bit looser and went with the medium size.

I cast on with my usual method, but it was too tight to join in the round.  The tutorial used a long tail cast on, which I have never tried, so pulled mine undone and following the very helpful casting on tutorial, also provided by the Crazy Sock Lady, I used that method.  It is a bit rough around the edges, but will do for a first attempt.  It is definitely much stretchier, so better for a sock top.

I got stuck in and completed the cuff and started on the leg on the first day.  

On the second day I finished the leg and was ready to tackle the heel flap.  There were two options, one using the 9 inch circular needle and the second using two DPNs.  I went with the DPN option and it worked well.

The heel turn wasn’t too bad either, which was also completed on the DPNs.  After that it was back on the circular to do the gusset, which went well.  On Friday it was time to do the toe decrease and the tutorial’s preferred method was to then change to a long circular needle and use the magic loop method, as the small circular would not work.  Another option was to use DPNs.  I don’t have a long circular in that size, so decided to use the DPNs.  What a muddle I ended up in.  I do, however, have two circular needles in that size in the 40cm length.  Too short for magic loop, but I figured I could use them, together with my tiny circular like DPNs, as they would be more flexible.  It was a strange method, but it worked for me.

So on the Friday before Christmas I have one sock. Maybe I should have been preparing for Christmas, but this was much more fun.  Christmas would look after itself.

Now to see if it fits….. remembering that my tension was quite tight. Fingers and toes crossed…..

Yay! A very nice fit around the foot, if just a tad tight around my chunky calf.  I can definitely live with that and they should fit nicely in shoes too.

Now, I wonder what I will be doing while watching the Boxing Day Test Cricket?  Let’s hope it goes for more than two days, so I can complete my second sock.