Fancy Feet

Tags

charts, lace patterns, Pattern, Regia, socks, toe-up, yarn

There’s been some white Regia 4-ply in my stash for a while, waiting to be turned into the right pair of socks. Lace socks. Like these socks.

The pattern is Sprig by Wei Siew Leong (aka KiwiPurler who blogs here). Mine look a little bit different because I started them at the toes. I didn’t turn the chart upside down. The lace pattern works well viewed in both directions. The only slight difficulty I had was in reading my knitting. It was a little tricky to anticipate which round was next without referring back to the chart. Of course once the lace is stretched across a foot, it all becomes clear.

I knitted these socks as part of the Aussie Sock Knitters first knit along of the year: undiscovered gems (patterns with fewer than 20 projects). Now as far as I’m concerned this is really a gem of a design. In fact I think these would look beautiful in black (sharp intake of breath at thought of knitting lace in black yarn on 2 mm needles). A friend helpfully pointed out that knitting them in grey and dying them black might be better. I think she’s right.

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European Knitting – The Socks

Tags

Germany, Pattern, Regia, socks, stripes, travel, yarn

What would a holiday that involved a lot of travelling be without socks? Socks on needles, to be knitted, of course!

There have been peeks of them already. These grey ones are the third pair I’ve made following Regina Satta’s pattern Jeck. I really like it as it has a bit of pattern on alternate rows. The purl stitches each side of the slipped stitches help those slipped ones stand out. This pair were made from one 100g ball of Regia sock yarn (the colour design is Vermont) and I just started the second sock as soon as the first one was finished. They don’t need to be identical as you can see here on the heels.

      

I was very keen to try out Geek Socks by Wei Siew Leong (aka KiwiPurler who blogs here).  I thought that this stripy yarn would work perfectly … until I started knitting. The black stripes were not clearly defined – in some rounds I had blotches of dark grey or black appearing before the black stripe. The notion of playing with the stripes still appealed, however, so I slipped alternate stitches in the first round of black (starting k1 sl1, k1 sl1) and in the first round of the following colour with (sl1 k1, sl1 k1), which gave me dotted black lines. Because I started the toe exactly where a new colour began, I was able to make an identical second sock.

     

This yarn, incidentally, is ALDI yarn! ALDI discount stores are now trading in several countries. In Germany, there are yarn or craft specials several times a year. Sock yarn is probably available twice if not three times. It is always packed in bags of 4 x 50g balls (with a set of five cheap 2.5mm DPNs) , usually two balls are plain and two are striped or patterned. The yarn comes from Max Gründl/Four Seasons Gründl or more recently Vendita (which seems to be a subsidiary company) and is as hard-wearing as Regia. Unfortunately, there were no such specials during my European trip. This yarn was already in my stash.

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Leaving on a jet plane…

Tags

aeroplane, Cologne, Noro, Regia, shawls, socks, Stitch 'n' Bitch, toe-up, trains

Not quite but soon! The top of my Ravelry queue reflects that too. 

First up Jeck. I’ve used this pattern before for Strrripes! which were also a travel project: Stripes – the love affair continues and for Making Merry. It’s mindless but not so mindless that you go crazy. Every second round has a little bit of activity with a few stitches to be slipped or purled. I’ll be starting at the toe (as usual) and working up so I’ll use Wendy Johnson’s Gusset Heel. I’ll be travelling on planes and trains for over 24 hours so that’s a lot of knitting time. You get a lot of knitting hours out of a ball of sock yarn!

Second in the queue is TGV. I have a ball of Noro Taiyo  for this.

Again this is very straightforward knitting; the first half is a garter crescent followed by a two-by-two ribbed frill. It will be perfect for when I visit my old Stitch ‘n’ Bitch group in Cologne as I’m sure there will be lots of chatting! After that? Probably more socks. This journey is the first of several…