I have decided to frog the Pomatomus sock – purely because I am unhappy with my workmanship. I will cast on again and knit more carefully next time.
With two froggings in quick succession I now need a “big hit” – a fast and easy completion. I thought I would knit the Hug yarn up immediately and I have cast on for a pair of Teosinte socks. Perhaps, in retrospect, not the ideal “big hit” project.
These are toe-up socks – because I continue to work at getting this method of construction comfortably under my belt. Once I feel competent at it I can safely leave it alone and return to my cuff-down preferences. I simply refuse to be defeated or to let the challenge slip away from me. So. Teosinte calls for the short row toe method that so defeated me in the Firestarters. I thought that maybe knitting it in a fatter yarn would help me to see what I was doing. Maybe. Maybe not. At any rate, I do now have a complete toe! It looks like the proverbial dog’s breakfast – and is clearly not correct, since I seem to have acquired some excess stitch count (how?)
Frog?
Nah. I’ll fiddle the stitch count and carry on. Nobody will see the toes but me.
Yes. I know. But I said that I needed a fast knit and a big hit, so just let’s drop any pretence of being Ms Perfect Knitter here, shall we? I am sure that the second sock will be better. If I get that far because…
… when I calculated the yarn weight conversion on this yarn, I seem to have forgotten that is not the whole equation. In fact, I seem to have forgotten that 100 gms is somewhat short of 4ozs and, converted or not, is really rather… short of requirement.
We should ignore (please!) the fact that I seem to have converted the yarn weight wrong anyway and it is not actually spot on for my pattern, but a little heavy. The gauge seems OK, though – maybe 1 or 1.5 rows out on the (4″) row gauge, but it’s spot on the stitch count.
I emailed Natalie to see if she has a spare 50gms. There’s 100 gms available in the shop but, for the sake of 40 yards, I am reluctant to cough up £10.75 that I don’t actually have. If I do have to buy the 100 gms then I suspect that I shall have to re-knit this toe and aim for perfection… on a £21.50 pair of socks. You can’t fudge toes at that price, can you? :-}
What I want to know is – why would anyone in their right senses want to fashion one of these toes anyway? It’s so lumpy and stiff, not to mention really awkward to knit. I much prefer the Judy’s Magic Cast On toe.
One step forward for me was to replace the crochet provisional cast on that I tried with the Firestarters – this time around I used the Open Cast On tutorial at Knitty.
The saving grace of these socks will be the yarn – lovely lofty Merino, in a colour so subtle and refined. The colour is called Crusty Bread. Teosinte sports an “ears of corn” pattern – what a perfect combination. This project has been named Bread and Beauty – from a quotation from John Muir, the Scots born naturalist and driving force behind the creation of the USA’s National Parks.
Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.
Hopefully these crusties will be beauties too – I had to resist the temptation to call these Beth’s Baguettes, with reference to the size and shape of my feet.
I fell totally under the spell of the Lochan as I wound it. It was difficult to restrain myself from beginning the Rivendells immediately. What gorgeous stuff, so soft, so lustrous. And the colour? I was simply reminded what a genius Natalie is. It isn’t simply that her colour choices coincide with my taste – no, often they do not, but I can still appreciate the subtlety of the colour. Really, as I wound this skein I was in complete awe of Natalie’s colour sense – this is a stunning skein.
It’s a good product too – never any tangled skeins and never, ever, any white patches. This is not true of skeins that I have bought elsewhere.
Go buy something – you won’t regret it. I am not affiliated and there’s no commission coming this way 😉 Just another happy customer.