Flower Power Socks

I finished knitting my second pair of socks, this time with colorwork! The pattern is from Volume I of Summer Lee’s Cuff Club, and the very first chart at that.

The flowers make me so happy, even if they look more like clovers in the deep teal yarn I chose for my contrasting color.

Knitting the colorwork

I realized midway through my first attempt at the colorwork that my float tension was a little dicey at the ends and midpoints of rounds. It was very likely too tight to be able to fit over my heel when all was said and done.

Sure enough, I looked things up and someone—likely Summer Lee herself—mentioned switching from Magic Loop to a shorter cable for colorwork. I ordered addi EasyKnit Rocket 10” Circular Knitting Needles (Size 2) and caaaarefully swapped these in for the color chart. This worked out great! One drawback is that these small circulars hurt my hands a little bit. If I were working on socks that had colorwork all over the foot, I would probably try other techniques to fix the float issue with Magic Loop. Stone Knits demonstrates her approach here, and I’ve also heard folks have success with knitting colorwork inside out.

Gusset

This is only my second pair of socks, and already I’m feeling much more comfortable picking up and knitting the gusset stitches! So much less drama than my first pair; it just kinda feels normal now.

Toes are weird

For this second pair of socks, I decided to knit a size M instead of a size L. I have long feet, but they’re not terribly wide. On my first pair, I learned that my right foot is longer than my left, so this time I knit to the length of my right foot.

Well. I tried the sock on my foot after closing up with Kitchener stitch, and the fit didn’t feel quite right. Kinda like the seam was just barely on the upper-back of my toes. I put the sock on my left foot and that felt better.

I realized that there are probably more rows on the size L than size M in order to decrease to toes to the final number of stitches you need. As I run quick math now, it does seem like there are 4 extra rows for the size L toespace.

Maybe I have longish toes? In any case, I decided to knit the foot of my second sock a little bit longer: to the bottom of the nail on my second-shortest toe, instead of the tip of my pinky toe. This certainly made the fit more comfortable on my longer foot!

Moar socks!

I’m really really enjoying two things in my knitting practice: socks and colorwork! I just want to knit all the socks.

• I have some pretty variegated sock yarn I bought from Flock Fiber Fest this year, which would be fun to use in a more textured pattern. I have a couple patterns from The Sock Project bookmarked, and I’m signed up for Cuff Club vol II.
• I’d like to try one of Stone Knits’ many delightful colorwork-all-over patterns. I already have both Joyful Colorwork Socks and Charming Colorwork Socks on hand.

Oh, to have a drawer full of socks of my own making!