Experiment in Texture and Stripes

Well, y'all knew it would be impossible for me not to start another pair of socks. It was more a question of "which yarn?" and "what pattern?" than anything else. Corrine and Karen and ks all suggested that they would like to see some of my Sock Hop yarn on the needles. And as I got to thinking about it, it did seem like a good idea.

But that left me with a decision to make about a pattern. Sock Hop (which you can find at Crown Mountain Farms website) is a 100% superwash merino handspun sock yarn. It has lovely marled stripes that result from the barberpoling that happens when the yarn is plied. Whatever I decided to do had to be compatible with stripes. And this yarn is handspun. Somehow, it didn't seem right just to knit my standard sock with handspun -- even if it wasn't my handspun. So I pulled out my Barbara Walker pattern books and began to survey them for patterns which create a bias in one direction or the other that might create an interesting effect with the striping.

Sock Hop Yarn in "Say A Little Prayer"

With the help of some lovely afternoon sun and a good latte I found a pattern that I liked, that I thought fit the scale of a sock. It combines alternating bias directions with a little bit of lace. Something I like because sometimes the techniques used to create the bias lead to a stiff fabric, and socks, in my book, aren't meant to be too stiff. I selected the Traveling Vine pattern from the first Treasury, converted it to chart form and knit a big ol' swatch out of Cascade 220 just to make sure that I'd interpreted the pattern instructions correctly. Then it was time to cast on my Sock Hop. So far I've completed the cuff and 1 full pattern interval. I'm hoping the texture will become more apparent when I've gotten farther, but I can already see the nice biasing effect in the stripes. The first repeat got me almost exactly an inch, so I've got at least 5 more of these to go.

I know that those of you hoping I would knit with my Sock Hop yarn were probably hoping that I would knit with my lovely orange "Hang on Sloopy". I guess I am not yet ready to experiment with that yarn yet. Since I love it so much, I'd like to play with a few of these biasing patterns to see if I can find just the perfect thing. I will say that I do like knitting with the Sock Hop yarn I bought a great deal. It is soft and smooth and has a nice cushiony feel. It is not spun completely consistently throughout, and there is no mistaking it for millspun yarn. But I think that is part of the charm of it. Not only does the color change, but there are subtle changes in texture as well. It adds an extra dimension to the yarn. And I find this particular colorway very soothing. Like a memory of spring. A nice thing to have in my hands as the leaves fall from the trees and I am confronted with the fact that cold weather will soon be here.