Category Archives: Socks

Penny Candy Socks ~ The Pattern

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jenjoycedesign©penny-candy-socks-detail
Remember these?

Well, I’ve been crunching numbers for a few days, and though I’ve lacked actual test-knitting of all the sizes, they seem correct  to me from a mathematical perspective. Written in sizes from Little Kid to Big Kid, and I will be test-knitting all the sizes I haven’t already, as the summer blossoms and wilts, and intending to have a lot of fun doing so !

So folks, the Penny Candy Socks pattern can be found HERE , and less than one week into summer, which is pretty good, as my goal was to post them on the actual Summer Solstice. Not bad at all.

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Just a little hello from my sister-in-law Pam’s feet & her dog Peggy !

Penny Candy Socks & Peggy

Penny Candy Socks

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Why not knit a pair of socks this summer? Or if you’re really fast . . . a few pair ? These short-cuffed “Penny Candy” striped socks are so reminiscent of childhood summers (to me) ! The stripes are two-rows wide and follow every turn, through the heel & heel turn and picked up and continued through the gussets into the foot, and through the toe. Uniform, unending, and you need not once cut a strand of yarn from beginning to the very end ! You will most surely will find a rhapsody of flavors in your own combination of colors, perhaps even from your own sock yarn stash. Lets go… and not waste another minute talking about it, because summer will be over before you know it !

Summer Sky

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jenjoycedesign©finished-un-sock

What a day it is today ! Actually, quite warm out, and the sun high in the sky, 1 o’clock,  perfect time to finish the first sock of two , and have it drying out on the line. The blue summer sky with whispy clouds (clouds not in this photo) .  Summer Sky socks for my sister-in-law (the one in Vancouver, who didn’t mention it , but I sensed a little bit of sock envy as I knit her father a pair the whole time I was there a couple of weeks ago ).  I hope to have these on her feet by the Summer Soltice coming up.

jenjoycedesign©striped-sock

Not just any sock, but once again, in my unrelenting quest for improvisation I went and striped everything, the heel flap , the everything ! And, did not follow a pattern, I think I finally get sock knitting !

Socks For Dale

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jenjoycedesign©finished-socks

It was a race to the end . . .

A couple of days before we were to travel to Vancouver in the honor of Dale’s ninetieth birthday , I decided I wanted to knit him a pair of socks.

jenjoycedesign©socks-peggy (1)

But I did it, I finished them, with only one minute to spare !

I had a half hour after the last cast-off stitch , to weave in all ends, steam-block in a hurry (in front of Dale, who watched in amazement how they transformed from a lumpy bumpy wad into a lovely flat pair of socks) , and then photograph.

Here they are with the adorable mascot Peggy.

jenjoycedesign©socks-peggy (2)

In my opinion, it was a bit of entertainment for all to see me knitting at every spare moment, while walking, dining out, while sat at the table in conversation . . . you name it, and then like a magic trick, while the second hand was ticking, they were finished and given to Dale with a hug (before having to rush off to a dance performance).

 He seemed very happy indeed !

jenjoycedesign©socks-for-Dale

Apologies Dale, for the hurried & back-lit photo xx

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Notes: If you look back on  this post  before I left to Vancouver, you’ll see that I was experimenting with a provisional cast-on just above the heel, which I knit down to the toe, and then after which I picked up the live stitches and knit upwards for the leg. Inside-out works quite well and I’d say undetectable if one is knitting stockinette stitch , but in this case with the 2×2 ribbing, the direction change was noticeable.  Hardly a reason to have done it differently, but just saying. It seems as I originally suspected (but which isn’t noticeable in a patternless fabric as stocking stitch, the ‘join’ so to speak, is off-set by a half-stitch it appears.  But this is not at all a problem, and ‘inside-out’ knitting is a technique I am going to explore more in the future !

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Details on Ravelry HERE

Roastery

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Met my sister-in-law in Calistoga today.  It was roasting hot too !!!  In fact, we are having upper 90 degree temperatures nearly all this week , especially in Calistoga , the hottest town in summer in the Napa Valley !   You wanna know what is very odd about this post?

Meeting for   c o f f e e   

and giving of   w o o l   s o c k s

in the middle of a California   A u g u s t .

No matter, because the Calistoga Roastery is one of the most bohemian nouveau places in the Napa Valley, and we always meet there when there’s something knitted to give.  Oh,  such as these sweaters .

Patricia loves her new wool socks,

and that makes it worth every tiny stitch !

And, as we do absolutely everytime we get together, she and I scour’d the local thrift shops.

I got to add to my collection of antique wooden hangers with the old businesses printed on them of cleaners and dye works.   Dye works?

 ( click the photo and notice a 3 digit phone number! )

Ode To Socks

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  I finished my second pair of Regular Ol’ Socks.  Socks as soft as rabbits, knitted by me!

Ode to My Socks  by Pablo Neruda

Mara Mori brought me
a pair of socks
which she knitted herself
with her sheepherder’s hands,
two socks as soft as rabbits.
I slipped my feet into them
as if they were two cases
knitted with threads of twilight and goatskin,
Violent socks,
my feet were two fish made of wool,
two long sharks
sea blue, shot through
by one golden thread,
two immense blackbirds,
two cannons,
my feet were honored in this way
by these heavenly socks.
They were so handsome for the first time
my feet seemed to me unacceptable
like two decrepit firemen,
firemen unworthy of that woven fire,
of those glowing socks.

Nevertheless, I resisted the sharp temptation
to save them somewhere as schoolboys
keep fireflies,
as learned men collect
sacred texts,
I resisted the mad impulse to put them
in a golden cage and each day give them
birdseed and pieces of pink melon.
Like explorers in the jungle
who hand over the very rare green deer
to the spit and eat it with remorse,
I stretched out my feet and pulled on
the magnificent socks and then my shoes.

The moral of my ode is this:
beauty is twice beauty
and what is good is doubly good
when it is a matter of two socks
made of wool in winter.

Sock Pattern :  “Classic Socks” in “Folk Socks”  by Nancy Bush
Yarn : 75% Superwash Merino/25% Nylon, in fingering weight
Find on Ravelry.

Sock News

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I am sort of taking a break from any projects which require  a lot of creativity, for a spell.   Sometimes I want to just defrag and knit a basic project, and contemplate more logical ideas.

For instance, sock knitting. Very basic sock knitting, I’ve decided, is extremely under-rated. I want to cultivate the utilitarian-ness of basic-sock-knitting, and I can’t really see myself ever becoming very decorative about them.   Just two knit/two purl rib sock knitting , where the numbers are multiples of 8, and really, for the adults and teens I know and love and knit for, and using fingering or even sport weight yarn, I’m figuring there are likely going to be two common sets of numbers to work from ~ total stitches being 56, or total stitches being 64.   Sport weight yarn with 64 or 56 stitches,  on #3 needles will be a large-ish sock, maybe a little snugger on size#2 needles (like for Kilt Hose !) , and I’m seeing that fingering weight yarn with 64 or 56 stitches and size#0 – #2 needles is a good variation of size range too. I’m knitting my second pair of Regular Ol’ Socks and  keeping very vigilently to #2 needles ~ this time careful to not accidentally knit with the #3 needles.

(Question: How can one so easily and so often mix them up? Answer: too many needles heeped in a cigar box, unlabelled).

I knit very snugly, and these stitches are super duper fine and …. well these puppies are tight! Imagine what I could do with fine fingering weight, my tight knitting, and size #0 needles !!! I could change the world ! Or… at least… I could knit some very fine, very nice socks for my wee hoofish feet, using 64 stitches, or even introduce a new number of 68 or 72 stitches… just imagine…knee-highs…with delicious rib decreases…and even increases !  I’m salivating !

So here is another observation I’m making : Using two 16in circular needles (a pain, yes, and having to adjust needles every half row is high-maintenance knitting for me, but must be done, because the 56-stitch socks in fine fingering weight yarn, stretched around one 9in circular needle is a job wrestling the whole way, pushing stitches along at their widest possible girth is also high maintenance.

Here we have progress with two 16in circular needles…


And here is progress with one 9in circular needle…

I must admit that I prefer low maintenance for something as ‘easy’ and ‘simple’ as a Regular Ol’ Classic Sock.  I’m thinking that streamlining the two 16″circular needle method is the best bet for a sock that’s not big (like for gent)… but for my feet, which are more like wee hooves of a baby burro… but   I still am sleuthing out the best method.

Edit In : Okay, for the second time , on the second pair of socks, I’ve decided a set of 4 double-pointed needles are actually the least bit fussy and least maintenance.  Suprising, since I have to switch out 3 times in one row !  Most importantly the yarn loops don’t get stressed when getting pushed between the fine cable and over the needle join.. where I’m constantly having to really pull and that I’ve decided , is the agitating ‘fiddly bit’ I can do without.  DPNS are IN.

Autumn Approaches

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Beautiful cascades of yarn I’ve over-dyed  plum and purple, to Eldest Niece’s specifications, for Autumn sweaters.  Jacquard acid dyes : pink dyed over light blue yarn, and then lavendar over heathered grey.   The over-dye and the original colors will make a lovely subtle  varigation in the stockinette fabric that I just can’t wait to see, and since there are two nieces, there will be Autumn Sweaters  (x 2) .  Take a look at the  other colorway  overdyed from the same yarns which I bought a boat load of in a closeout sale.   Superwash 100% Merino wool.  Drinks in the dye, and exhausts the dyebath so nicely ! But committing to overdyed colors , I have found,  is strenuous at times, because there’s no “I’ll just exchange these 5 skeins for another color” sort of thinking. Nooo… I have to make it work, in a sort of determined marriage to the yarn.  So far I’ve casted on after switching needle sizes and swatching four times !

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Meanwhile,  Classic Socks pair number two continues to grow.

(Yes… more purple.)

Happiness Is…

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My first pair of regular ol’ socks done & dusted !

:: claps wildly ::

And now I think I’ll start another pair just the same as I finished, in lavendar heathered yarn, and they will be for my nieces’ mom.

Sock Pattern : “Classic Socks” in “Folk Socks” by Nancy Bush
Yarn : 75% Superwash Merino/25% Nylon, in fingering weight
Find on Ravelry.

Summer Breeze

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It’s particularly quiet on the mountain this morning.

In the summer stillness of Northern California, there is usually no weather to report for months on end. Sometimes there is a breeze. Sometimes a little fog which swells up from the valley in the morning. Sometimes a relentless wind which cracks off dried branches from the trees in the forest and whips off tips of new growth, littering the country road.

The wind whistling through the tree tops is the most eerie up in the Rafters O’ Society, above the towns, overlooking ridges which  overlap , one behind another clear into the next county. Because in the breeze one hears a kind of silence which is felt in the restless sound of the trees quivering. The fact that one hears *only* the breeze, I guess is what makes it seem so quiet.

(Two pensive ravens perched in a dead fir tree, photographed with a zoom from my house, yesterday early evening.)

I do like rain, or even a lot of rain ~ in fact, I love rain.  But for now there’s blue sky. Lots and lots of clear, dry, and very blue sky.  This summer season makes me feel rather despondent, clear through September.  I must hunker down in the shadows.  It’s time to make a good strong pint of tea and stir things up.

In the dusty wild west, where things are a few degrees removed from finery, some of us pioneers, well, we devise our own way of doing things.  I do have a couple of small tea pots, but I have gotten into the habit over the years to brew loose-leaf tea in a canning jar,  sometimes a pint sized (to be pour’d into a pint glass) , but more times than not, I make up in a quart-sized jar.  What is left can easily be put into the fridge for cold tea later, which is a treat in the summer heat.

This really isn’t about tea, or the wind, or the ravens.  Its about my changing course,  about drinking in what nature brings to me, and waiting for the wind in my sails again.  Having  had a house full of family for an epic family reunion I am ready for something cheerfully  rejuvenating.   I am going to shake it loose and default to some good ol’ classic knitting ! So time to finish these…

I learn from my mistakes very clumsily,  like using a machete through the bush, I rip back and then knit forward, rip and knit, rip, knit.

Last night I had to rip back the mindless knitting I had apparently done while at a long break during a gig last weekend, I kept decreasing through the heel gussets (two at a time mistake) and ended up with far too few stitches. So, having fixed that, now I am merrily on my way again.

Amusing

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Okay folks,  I really blew it.  So badly in fact, that I’m embarrassed to admit it, but come to think of it, I’m positive it’s a mistake common enough among knitters, but it is quite amusing. Still. I knit merrily along on the first sock using two 16″ circular needles ~ five inches of 2/2 rib in fact ~ and I realized something funny about it when I wanted to start up the second, to catch up to the first. Don’t you know…I had two different sized needles on the sock.  Yup the correct size #3 and then for the second needle, a #2.  Yes, I admit to you total brainlessness, but at this point I’m really laughing because:

I thought I’d start ribbing on sock #2 with the suggested size needles for the pattern , #3’s, and see if they are really all that different.  Either my karma is for me , or against me, hard to tell, because after knitting knit 1.5 inches on second sock, I noticed I did the very same thing, used both a #2 and a #3 in the ribbing…. again !!!! How can this be? I have a needle size measuring tool ! Ha ha…

I suppose it’s better this way, making the two ribbed sections the same. Blow off knitting over, I’m going to just repeat my mistake.  In fact, I’ve fashioned this neat method of knitting 3/4’s of the round with one needle, then switching, knitting 3/4’s of a round again, and so on, thus rotating the different sizes around the sock pretty swiftly. My guess is that is will jsut look like homespun.  Oh, and I will make for dang sure I switch to *both* needles #3 when I begin the foot section next.

I have successfully knit both socks to the end of the rib, but I’m noticing my left thumb hurting a bit. (drat). I am ready to knit the heel flaps !!!!  Last time I did this was the one pair of kilt hose, when Morrie coached me through the eye-of-partridge-stitch last year about this time. This pattern does not call for any particular stitch for the heel, just has knitting pattern instruction… just ” Add reinforcing yarn if desired.” Um…  I need Morrie ! (Morrie, do you have Nancy Bush’s “Folk Socks”? ( Pg.59) And Lizzi ! And Sarah !

Okay though, seriously, my thumb is killing me, and I’ve got to stop knitting. I believe it is from playing a 4hr gig on Sunday which has inflamed the tendons, and now this frantic sock knitting has made it quite sore. Going to put the needles down for the rest of the day.

Folk Socks

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Have started a little project from this book :

The “Classic Sock” .

Finally something for Jeff, though I had to twist his arm leg to let me knit them for him.  He’s just so sensitive to anything even remotely woolly, but I’m very confident the soft superwash merino wool & nylon blend will be soft enough. At about a thousand stitches per inch, these are going to take the remainder of spring and into the summer.  However, I do have a little fantasy of whipping them out, then carrying on with yet another pair from the same book ~maybe the Welsh Country Stockings I posted over in the sidebar, which I envision making for my sister-in-law (I’ve bought the yarn already) Then, after flying through those, I’ll be finally ready to knit myself a pair of knee-high socks of some kind.  Maybe even still another from the book, such as the ” Schottische Kilt Hose” from the same book … or something very kilt-hose-like from another source. We’ll see, that’s far down the road, and as yet, aside from these kilt hose … I’ve not knit a single pair of regular socks yet ! Ever !

Kilt Hose Finished !

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They’re done, and I will miss them, but the person they’ve been custom made for will be more than happy I hope, so I will send them off to Northern Ireland, and they will be ready when his kilt cloth gets off the loom and is being sewn into his kilt in Glasgow.  It was very nice to partake in a custom of Scottish tradition, and I must add , thanks to Maureen for her help teaching me the heel turn and other aspects of sock knitting! (all posts about this project here, and details on Ravelry here. )

In the Home Stretch.

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I am learning *so* much about so many things with this unexpectedly epic little project : a braided cable, cuffing and reversing direction of knitting, narrowing down into a garter section (I chose to use smaller needles as well), Eye-of-Partridge stitch, sock gussets, and soon to be toe shaping and kitchener stitch… and I’m reinforcing my skill in reading a pattern (something I haven’t done much of, strangely). I had to totally improvise picking up stitches, and I got my SSK and K2tog mixed up a few rows on the first kilt sock gusset start (quite obvious if you look closely at the one on the left). So far these have been a hugely valuable learning experience (John Anderson’s Kilt Hose on Ravelry here)