Socktoberfest 2009 (2)

The socks are finished!

These socks were, as most of my projects are, started with good intentions but finished in a MacGuyver style. All I used from the Nutkin pattern was the stitch count and the chart. I decided to make these toe up so I could use up all the yarn. After getting cranky with Judy's Magic Cast On - which is magical, but frankly, I'm bad at it - I used a standard short row toe and heel with a provisional crochet cast on.

I got halfway up the legs and realised that I had half the yarn left, and I didn't want to make knee high socks. So I still have somewhere in the region of 180 metres of yarn left and not a clue what to do with it.

I knitted both socks up to the ankle before I started on the legs, at which point I realised that one foot was longer than the other. The heel was too long and pointy. So I cut carefully and unravelled the tip of the short row heel, and then grafted the hole closed. It worked quite successfully - you can't see the join unless you look for it, and I can't feel it when the socks are on my feet.

The cuffs are a very simple 4 rows of 1x1 rib and a sewn bind off. I needed it to be very short as otherwise it would have gone past the narrow part of my leg and over the wide part of my calf, and would have needed more stitches. And I wasn't frogging the pattern back just for the sake of a longer cuff.

Now to finish some of my other half-completed sock projects!