Gentle reader,
I have a song for you. Here ‘tis:
“This is the sock that doesn’t end! It just goes on and on, my friend! I started knitting it not know what it was, and I’ll continue knitting it forever just because this is the sock that doesn’t end…”
Oy. I don’t know what my problem is with socks. I love socks. I feel immense satisfaction when I finish a sock. This sock even has an amazing stitch pattern that makes me want to knit it all the time, and yet, sock knitting takes me FOREVER! I mean, I’m not a fast knitter to begin with. Especially compared to my crocheting, but there’s just something about socks that gums up the works and my knitting mojo runs for the hills. SO CRAY. I can’t even wrap my head around it.
So, this sock was for the Sock The Vote knit-along by the incomparable, amazing, fantastic and infinitely lovely Melissa of Singlehanded Knits (which is a podcast y’all should watch right now if you don’t already. Go subscribe in iTunes now. I’ll wait……………. It’s downloading now? Fantastisch!). I intended to knit a pair of these amazing socks from a book called “Knitted Socks East and West” by Judy Sumner, by the time the US Presidential winner was announced. Realistic, right? Nup. Not for me. I’m the legit actual driver of the FAILbus.
I’ve still not finished the first sock. I’m still on the gusset (which is ginormous because of my crazy tight tension so I had to puck up a squillion stitches, don’t even ask). I won’t be making the pair, I can tell you that much. Not because I don’t like the pattern – I LOVE the pattern to the point where if it were a person it would be creepy – but I get second sock syndrome HARD, and I’d rather knit one sock and enjoy it and love it and just wear odd socks, than force myself to knit the twin and suffer a psychotic break and find myself wearing a straightjacket, curled up fetal in the corner of a padded room, licking the air and chatting to the Wizard of Oz and Joan of Arc like it ain’t no thang. But I digress…
The sock itself is called Bonsai, and I ADORE the pattern. It looks kind of like a cable, but it’s actually not. It’s a really interesting Japanese stitch trick. When you purl across to the three knit stitches, you skip two stitches, pick up the third stitch with the right needle and drop it over the first stitches and off the left needle so it’s wrapped around the first two knit stitches. Then you knit the first stitch, yarn over, knit the second stitch and BOOM It’s so neat! You should definitely get the book, it has a whole bunch of cray-to-the-azy Japanese stitch techniques. If you’re like me, you’ll squeal for weeks. It shut. My. Brain. DOWN, y’all! I’ll defs be writing up a review for the book when I’ve finished the sock.
Also, I’ve put it onto DPNs to do the heel flap and gusset, but I’ve been using this 9” circ that I bought from HiyaHiya. It’s SO good. For realz. I started the sock on DPNs because DPNs are my fave way to do socks, but I could only find nickel-plated ones in the size I needed and they were too slippery and I kept losing stitches off the ends no matter how careful I was, so I switched to two circs because I quite like two circs, not as much as DPNs, but I’m possibly the only person on the face of the planet that doesn’t like magic loop (longest sentence ever). I mean, I get magic loop, I appreciate magic loop, I respect magic loop for its contribution to knitting, and we get along, we’re civil – friend even – but we’re not on each other’s Christmas card list, y’know?
Then, I was watching Eunny Jang doing a demo on Knitting Daily – because Eunny Jang is the legit actual best and I love her forever (but not creepy-like, promise. Eunny! Call me! TOTALLY kidding!) – and she had a tiny circ, and I says to myself I says “I NEED ALL THE TINY CIRCS!”. So, Google, PayPal and Aus Post later, I had myself a tiny circ and I’m in love with it. It was awkward at first, but once I got used it, it was awesome. My sock went so much faster (still not fast enough, evidently /eyeroll). Once I’ve finished the gusset I’ll knit my little circ back in and finish this sucker off.
Even though Sock The Vote is well over, and I’m a Late Larry The Lame-o Who Is Late, I’ve still got it in my awesome-sauce Sock The Vote project bag. Isn’t it neat? There were a whole bunch of other goodies that came with it, but that’s the bumper sticker there. I’ve not decided what to put it on. I’m so nutty about where to put stickers. Special ones, I mean, because you want to put it somewhere where you can appreciate the sticker forever. I have a Midlake sticker which I got as a freebie when I bought my Midlake band shirt (because I’m a Midlake super-fan, and clearly I’ve not said Midlake enough yet. Midlake, Midlake, Midlake!!!), and my Sock The Vote sticker, and I’m too scared and fussy to put them on anything! I actually still have a Jurassic Park sticker that I got when I went on the ride at Universal Studios TWELVE years ago that I’ve never put on anything. I have a problem. HELP ME! Where do you think I should put my stickers?
Also, tell me what you’re working on, y’all! And what crafty things slow you right down for inexplicable reasons? Is it even a thing? Or am I the only one? Eek! Comments = Love.
