Not entirely on purpose, I stayed up last night until I finished the second of John's socks. For the record, yes, I did stay up until 3 am finishing up a pair of socks. Why? I really hadn't meant to. But I got to a certain point... and then I just had to finish. I don't know if there is anyone else with that bit of obsessive compulsive disorder, but once I get to a point that I consider myself withing "striking distance" of the end of the project, I just can't sleep or switch gears until I get it finished.

And, of course, it also got really cold yesterday, so I wanted John to have some nice warm socks, since he always complains about having cold feet. So without further ado, here are the finished socks (my first pair of finished socks!) as modeled by John's feet:

Some discoveries I made along the way:

1) Mission Falls 1824 Wool is nice and soft but untwists easily and you can snag it without even noticing it.
2) K2P2 ribbing has a better "rhythm" that K1P1 ribbing
3) Mistakes don't show up on dark socks (nothing shows up on dark socks!)
4) Knitting into the back of the stitches after picking up stitches after making the gusset really makes for a much firmer seam.
5) Its hard for me to get that corner area stich nice and tight
6) I want to try short row heels... (in hopes of dealing better with discovery #5)
7) I can knit and read blogs at the same time

Overall I am pleased -- and John seems to like them. I made him promise to wear them right after I finished them, so today he is going to test drive them. He isn't sure about one of the "seams" on the inside where the stitches got picked up, so he asked me if he could wear them inside out. I told him "whatever makes him happy" since, after all, they are his socks!

One more thing before I head to work....

Happy Birthday, Julie!

(I couldn't ask for a better knitting buddy -- she's creative and free-thinking and a great friend! If you have a few minutes, drop by her blog and wish her a good day!)