Eh

I hadn't really looked at the Broadripple pattern when I thought it would be good for the Socks That Rock. Turns out, the pattern calls for a 56-stitch cast on with size 3 needles (and stretchy cotton Cascade Fixation). That's not really what I was looking for. I was happy with the way the yarn felt on size 1's with a 68-stitch cast on. I tried it, secretly hoping it would pool. The yarn and the needles weren't getting along, the garter ripple cuff looked crappy, and the stripes came out perfectly. It does look a little too big, but I can't be sure yet. I don't know if I want to keep it in this pattern, but I think I don't. There is a 72-stitch cast on version available from the author, apparently, but I'm not sure I want to bother. Plus, I found someone who tried it with my exact yarn and it pooled big time. See the plain column of four knit stitches down the center? That's the part that bugs me in nearly every striped Broadripple I look at. Can't really explain it. It's like I want there to be a point there instead of it being flat. And that makes me think I should consider another pair of Jaywalkers. I wore my one pair the other day and they are fantastic looking, but they just don't stay up as well as other socks because they're so inflexible. All this boils down to a big fat I don't know what to do.

Mini knitting

The New York Times site is being wiggy right now, but through it yesterday I found out about an art exhibit featuring knitting and lace. Here are some tiny gloves. I knit some mini Jaywalkers last night, not that you can tell what the pattern is.The new Blogger won't resize my photos to fit the browser window anymore. I wrote to the help people and have received nothing.

Update: OK, if you click on an image and it's huge and you want to fit it all on one screen, right click the huge image and select "view image." This takes you from a huge image hosted at blogger to an image that will resize to fit the window, hosted at google. No idea what you should do on a Mac. And bloggers having this problem should remove the "-h" from "s1600-h" in the html code per these instructions. Fix this please, Blogger!

Completed Jaywalkers

I finally felt ready to tackle the Jaywalkers over Labor Day weekend. I hadn't touched them in months because I'd discovered a second mistake I'd made, one I wasn't willing to live with. I was afraid I'd have to start the sock all over but actually managed to rip it back to the scene of the first mistake, which was in the gusset, and put it back on the needles. The sock flew from then on and I love the way the yarn (Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in Icehouse) patterned. I used size 1 needles and the larger (84 stitch CO) size. They're not all that easy to slip on, but they fit well once I get them over the heel.

Closeup photo, not so true coloring:

Jaywalking trouble

So I moved past my mistake in the foot decrease and kept knitting. But I neglected to follow the pattern exactly and now I've stopped working on it because I am thinking of ripping it out. I'd love to rip it back to just before the decrease mistake but I'm not sure I can. Ripping out socks only partway is difficult. So I may have to start this second sock entirely over. I haven't touched the damn thing in ages and have been working on another pair of socks, where I'm happy to say the purling three together through the back has gotten easier. But I still think I prefer the flap heel to the short row heel.

My mistake

Not huge, but I might have to wear it on the left foot so it's not staring me in the face when I cross my legs.