H’s has been complaining how his winter hat from last year was just too short and tight, and wouldn’t I knit him one that fitted right? Of course I would. We picked out some aran weight grey/brown yarn (Bergère de France Irland 21658) and a pattern. It was a pretty quick knit (less than a week). I cast on the large size and lengthened the main part of the hat (up to 62 rows instead of 46) so it would go over his ears.
Now that H. got his pair of socks, I wanted to make some for me. At the craft fair (handwerkbeurs) I found the yarn (I wanted something purple) for my pair. I used two 100 gram skeins of Zitron Trekking XXL 334, which is a mix of a lot of purple with some brown. For the pattern I used another one of my Two-at-a-time patterns, Twilight this time. It is a basic combination of knit rows and a knit and purl ribbing. Very easy, but it looks very nice. It took me exactly three weeks to knit, and that is with some busy weeks and weekends. The only thing I would change next time is use a looser and wider cast-on. Right now it is pretty tight, and with my fat calves, I cannot pull up the socks all the way. But on the other hand, this time I managed to knit the two socks almost entirely as meant in the book, so that is an improvement over last time.
After the success with the little trial socks I just had to knit a real pair of socks. Nobody appreciates nice hand-knit socks more than H., he always wears them at home when it gets colder. So, H. and I picked out a pattern from my 2-at-a-time book (by Melissa Morgan-Oakes) and we went to the wonderful yarn shop in town, and he picked out this yarn. It is Scheepjeswol Super Noorsewol Extra (two parts white, one black, number 1716). The pattern is Ragg Hiker, the very last one in the book.
It took me some work to find out the correct gauge. I never did manage to get my swatch to match the book, but after some trying I figured out that if I knitted the smallest size of the pattern, it would come out large enough for H. I used a size 4 (EU size) circular needle.
It seemed to me that the leg took forever to knit, and I could not wait to start turning the heel. When working on the heel I messed up a bit with regards to the 2-at-a-time technique, I knitted the reinforced heel one at a time, but I should have knitted them for both socks at the same time. This caused my socks to be on the needles wrong, so for the rest of the heel and the toes, I moved each sock on to its own needle.
The only thing I am not quite happy about it the final closing of the stitches using the Kitchener stitch. This leaves a bit of a bump on the tip of the sock, so maybe next time I will knit my final stitches on a much smaller needle and help it close up that way.
I just finished my first pair socks and I am so proud, despite the mistakes and the small size. I used “2-at-a-time socks” by Melissa Morgan-Oakes. When I fixed the errata the method worked really well and it was much easier than I thought. So, here they are, my first pair of socks. :-)
- Posted using MobyPicture.com
One of my goals this vacation was to learn how to knit socks. For this I bought the book “2-at-a-time socks” by Melissa Morgan-Oakes. I started with the sample socks, in two colors just to learn the technique. I made one small error in the cuffs and shortened the legs, but all in all it’s going well. I hope to finish them this weekend and start working on some useable socks.
- Posted using MobyPicture.com
I’m working some more on my Boneyard Shawl, and nearly finished my first ball of yarn. Outside the weather is awful, heavy rain, fast winds and thunder and lightning. I am happy I am safe inside with my knitting and my tv shows.
- Posted using MobyPicture.com
I have just started knitting my first ever real knitting project, a Boneyard Shawl (pattern on Ravelry). Going really well so far. :-)
- Posted using MobyPicture.com
