Bloomin'...take two

Today was an impossible day for photos. It was either bright sunshine or really dark thunderstorms.

For the Bloomin' socks, I did what I hardly ever do. I ripped back a project after it was finished. I took out the cuff and all of the flower section. I'm very happy with how it looks now. I took away a few lines from underneath the flower. I also made the flower larger and knit several more rows for a bigger rolled cuff.

This sock is very easy to resize. The leaves and flower are on a purl back ground. It's easy to add or subtract stitches from either side to make the sock wider or narrower. This sock started with 64 stitches for the foot. Towards the heel, I added 4 additional stitches to the sole. I kept those stitches for the leg and I am very pleased with the fit of the socks. In my pattern, I wrote it for 64 stitches throughout without my added increases. These socks have a 7 inch relaxed circumference and a 10 inch stretched circumference.

Bloomin' is a free pattern that you can download from ravelry. That link should work even if you're not a member of ravelry.

To recap some details about the socks that I made:

Yarn: Opal Uni solids in a dusty rose color (65 gms used for pictured pair)
Needle: size 0 (2mm) Knit Picks Classic Circular
Pattern: Bloomin' by me
Method: magic loop, 2 at once, toe-up, Turkish cast-on, short row heel, rolled cuff

Bloomin'...take one

Here is sock #5 in the 52 Pair Plunge II. This is another design by me. I've wanted to do a sock that had a vine-ish look to it starting at the toe and ending with something pretty near the cuff. This is a combination of a few different stitch patterns. I took the elements that I liked and put them together. This pattern will be written up, but I've changed the charts. I want to knit it with the chart changes and take pictures of that one for the pattern.

Overall, I was happy with this pattern. I changed the flower a little bit and I definitely changed the cuff. I wanted a rolled cuff, but it didn't roll as much as I thought it would. As it is, it looks odd to me. I know that I don't want a typical ribbed cuff, but I'll deal with that when I get to that section on the next pair.

Pair #5 for the 52 Pair Plunge II
Yarn: Opal Uni solids in a dusty rose color
Needle: size 0 (2mm) Knit Picks Classic Circular
Pattern: Bloomin' by me(will be written up after I make corrections)
Method: magic loop, 2 at once, toe-up, Turkish cast-on, short row heel, rolled cuff
Start: June 15, 2008
Finish: June 19, 2008

I must say that I was surprised and overwhelmed at the response to the Magic Mirror socks. They've been linked from Lime and Violet's Chum and Craftzine's blog. I've gotten a lot of hits from those two places in addition to ravelry. On ravelry, there are a few people that have started the pattern already and have posted pictures. That's exciting for me to see my pattern knit by other people. I can't wait until the finished pictures are posted!

Up next, I'm knitting with a very dark variegated yarn. Talk about a yarn being difficult to find an appropriate stitch pattern. I've searched through all of my stitch dictionaries and I think that I found one that won't compete too much with the colors.

Magic Mirror socks

Here is pair #4 for the 52 Pair Plunge. As long as I'm still having fun, socks will keep on coming at this pace. The socks aren't getting old or repetitive as long as I keep doing interesting patterns or challenging myself to come up with a pattern of my own. This pair is one of my own and I LOVE it. The charts that I made for these socks are huge and I wasn't sure if the curves would come out smooth. When I started these socks, they do look large from the lace sections and the twisted ribbing. After knitting the foot, it starts to pull in and become a very snug, stretchy sock. I think that this sock should fit a wide variety of foot sizes.

These were knit at the same time on one needle. That was interesting and challenging for my brain. Since I wanted the socks to mirror each other, I had to follow one chart for one sock and then a different chart for the other. Some knitters might even be able to flip the chart in their head. I didn't want to try that because ripping or tinking back on magic loop is a pain. ;-)

Details:
Pair 4 for the 52 Pair Plunge 2.
Yarn: Knit Picks Essential in Pumpkin (used 72 gms)
Needle: size 0 (2mm) Knit Picks Classic Circular
Method: magic loop, 2 at once, toe-up, Turkish cast-on, short row heel
Pattern: Magic Mirror socks
Start: June 8, 2008
Finish: June 11, 2008

I think that I've gotten used to taking a picture of the backs of my own legs. These socks were posted to ravelry already and the response has been huge. Thanks to everyone for all of the nice compliments. That lit a fire under me and I was determined to get this pattern out quickly. It still wasn't as quick as I wanted. I had to argue with word, excel, the pdf converter, and photoshop. That was mostly me trying to experiment in many ways to keep the file size reasonable.

Now that I have one pattern done, I have a few others here that will be written up some time soon.

Too many ideas...

I'm still going strong with the 52 Pair Plunge 2. I'm actually ahead of the one-pair-a-week schedule. That's good because I'll need a break from socks sometime in the next year. I've been looking through stitch dictionaries and coming up with my own patterns. Now I have too many stitch patterns that I want to alter to fit into socks.

These super bright yellow socks were knit from a stitch pattern that was really easy to fit onto socks. The yarn is solid Cherry Tree Hill color. I really like their solid yarns. It feels springy and doesn't split at all. I decided to put the picot edge at the top simply because I was tired of ending my socks in 2x2 or 1x1 ribbing. I like the picot edge because it's thick, feels sturdy, and is pretty. I'm not fond of having to sew it down.

Details:
Yarn: Cherry Tree Hill solids-yellow
Needle: size 0 (2mm) Knit Picks Classic Circular
Pattern: basic sock with stitch from a stitch dictionary
Method: magic loop, 2 at once, toe-up, Turkish cast-on, short row heel, picot cuff
Start: June 3, 2008
Finish: June 5, 2008

This is my Monkey pair for the 52 Pair Plunge 2. Over on the Ravelry group, they picked out two patterns for June. One pattern was Monkey, so I added it to my queue for this month. I've knit this pattern before, but never with Socks that Rock. In fact, I've never used any of the Socks that Rock yarn before now. This is their lightweight yarn, but it felt like sport weight to me. It was definitely thicker than most indie dyed yarns that I've used. The socks turned out really dense and should make a nice winter sock, despite the lace. I like how the yarn pooled into stripes. I did the picot edge again and was a little faster at sewing it down.

Details:
Yarn: Socks that Rock lightweight in Emerald City (used 95 gms)
Needle: size 0 (2mm) Knit Picks Classic Circular
Method: magic loop, 2 at once, toe-up, Turkish cast-on, short row heel, picot cuff
Notes: This yarn is on the thicker side for sock yarns, but I had to use a 2mm needle or the socks would have been too big. This resulted in a very dense sock. It should be great for next winter.
Start: June 5, 2008
Finish: June 7, 2008

And this is what I'm working on right now. This pattern was heavily altered from a stitch pattern that I found. I love how these socks are turning out. I started calling them my Mirror socks because of how they mirror each other. Now I'm calling them my Magic Mirror socks. Why? Because they look so shriveled, small, and kind of ugly on the needles. They look great on my foot and stretch a lot. I think that this pattern wouldn't need to be altered much to fit a wide variety of foot sizes.

And speaking of patterns, I really want to write up a few of these socks as patterns. I also haven't posted about two lace scarves that I've knitted because I want to write up the patterns to post along with them. I need to get with it and start writing them before the backlog gets too long and overwhelming that I don't do it at all.

If you're wondering how I had time to do all of this, it's because Dwight took the kids camping. I stayed home because my allergies have been super annoying this season. Over the weekend, I managed to sew 4 dress for E, finish the Monkey socks, start on the Magic Mirror socks, and do all sorts of cleaning. Not bad. I also had a lot of fun watching old New Kids on the Block videos on youtube. I obsessed over the guys back in the day and it's so exciting to see that they're together again and working on an album.

And it begins...

The 52 Pair Plunge started on June 1st and runs for a year. The goal is to knit 52 pairs of socks in one year. I think that I can do that easily. To challenge myself, I'm trying to come up with some of my own designs. I'm using stitch dictionaries for inspiration. I plan on trying to write up a few of them as patterns. We'll see. I've tried to write a pattern before and I tend to get really wordy.

This is my first pair and I had a lot of fun with it. The chart was too big to memorize, but the socks were still a fast knit. The pattern is really stretchy. I don't think that I would have to size this up very much for anyone, but it would be difficult to size down.

Details:
Yarn: Dream in Color Smooshy in Dusky Aurora (used approx. 80gms)
Needle: size 0 (2mm) Knit Picks Classic Circular
Pattern: mine using a stitch dictionary
Method: magic loop, 2 at once, toe-up with Turkish cast-on, short row heel
Start: June 1, 2008
Finish: June 3, 2008

I said that I would take better pictures of my Marie Antoinette socks and here they are. If socks could be sexy, I would say that this one qualifies. I love the detail in these socks, especially down the back. I don't knit too many patterns more than once, but I really want to knit this one again. This was such a fun pattern and surprisingly quick.

Another pretty shot: