Recently in Sock Challenge Category
Hi All! This Labor Day Edition of the Family Sock Challenge comes with some fun new news! To start off with, I'd like to welcome Michelle to the party. Michelle, who starts off with a finished pair of Jaywalkers just happens to be the owner of a the Sweet Sheep a new online yarn store based in Canada. Michelle has some great standard yarn lines, hand dyes sock yarn herself, and also carries some other nice hand dyed sock yarn. The reason I mention this (although who really needs a reason when hand-dyed sock yarn is involved?), is that she has given me a coupon code to share, in case you're looking to do a little yarn shopping. If you type ML010 into her coupon code box in your shopping cart, you can get 10% off your order. How cool is that? I just placed a little order myself. A girl can never have too much hand-dyed sock yarn, can she? Especially when she has a sock challenge to work on! (Just a note, before the coupon code will work, you need to register with her site -- it's a very low impact process).
We also have another new participant in the group. Cathy is getting started with a bang. She's just finished a pair for her sister-in-law and is midway through pairs for her Mother-in-Law and Husband. Cathy has a small person on the way, so I think she's going to be a busy sock knitter indeed!
Meanwhile, a number of other people have been busy, too! Jessica finished up a pair of Opal Ladybug socks for her Mom and has started on a pair for a good friend. Janine has finished a pair of striped footies for her daughter. She claims she hasn't been knitting many socks, but if you check out her blog, it looks like quite a few pairs of very creative socks have been coming off of her needles! Carole has been knitting up a veritable storm of family socks: a lovely pair for her stepdaughter, and 2 pairs of socks (one for vacation, one for a birthday) for her daughter Hannah. Three pairs of socks in just about a month. And, last but not least, Michelle finished a pair for her son, Justin. He's completely adorable, and definitely worth a click just to see the picture of him modeling his socks.
So all told -- that's 8 more pairs of socks!
I'm working on my final pair for the challenge -- a special pair for my aunt. I also started another pair for myself.. as research for my aunt's pair, don't you know?
Wanna see the whole list? Here it is!
It's time for another round up of what's going on for the Family Sock Challenge. Summer is always a quiet knitting time, but there have been a few new pairs of socks since my last post.
Annie finished a second pair of socks for her daughter (no pictures that I'm aware of) out of Opal Flamingo and got a pair started for her husband using Regia Jaquard. Maggie just finished a pair for her brother (or Brotherman as she likes to call him) and has gotten started on another pair for a special person. I also finished a pair of socks for my brother and just today I got started on my final pair. So that's three new pairs of socks that have entered the lives of our friends and family. I've also started another pair for myself --- I had to do some "research" for my aunt's socks. I'll be posting more about both pairs in one of my regular blog posts soon.
As always, here's the current score card. And should you want to join, there's still room for more. With the winter holidays coming up, I'm betting a bunch of you will be knitting socks for your family and friends anyways...
We had a lovely weekend in Michigan. And there will be Michigan Fiber Festival pictures coming soon -- from a very unique perspective. But first, a pair of finished socks.
I finished my brother's socks this morning while giving a sock making lesson to my mom -- her first sock outing with double pointed needles, and she took to them much better than I did the first time I tried them out. They are a bit loose in the toe (my dad and John modelled them for me so I could check fit) but both my Dad and John didn't seem all that bothered by it. So they will be on their way to Houston soon and if they are a bit too loose, I'll have my brother bring them back for Christmas and I'll custom fit them then. Since they are a very simple and straightforward pair of socks, and it's getting late here in Chicago, I think I'll leave the discussion at that.
So now I've got all but one pair of socks for my Family Sock Challenge complete. My aunt's are next. And working on Joe's socks first was exactly the right thing to do. Giving myself some extra time to think, I now know exactly how my "Feline Feet" socks are going to be from a design perspective, and I got a chance to figure out a gauge I like using Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks that Rock, medium weight in addition to testing out a new-to-me cuff technique. So more interesting socks will be on their way, soon.
Actually, it was a very good weekend for design ideas as well. Once I get my aunt's socks finished, I have another idea that I am just burning to try.
Speaking of a little burning... John and I got to see the tail end of a lovely sunset over Lake Michigan at Warren Dunes State Park on Sunday evening..
It was the perfect ending to a lovely day that involved doing nothing in particular except being with my family and getting some knitting done.
Top of the week to everyone!
Sometimes looking at a sock is like looking at the rings in a tree: you can see what's been going on in the past over the period of time the sock was being knitted. Case in point: the first of two socks for my brother as part of my Family Sock Challenge.
Amazing how much stuff gets caught up in one size 11 man-sized sock.
What stories do your socks have to tell? I'd love to see other people's sock-life diagrams!
For the record, the sock was knit top down using Regia Linien Color # 5281, on US size 1 needles, at approximately 8 stitches/inch. There's an inch and a half of K2P2 ribbing at the top,5 and a half inches of straight stockinetted, a short-row heel a la Patricia Priscilla Gibson-Roberts, and a 4 point toe after 9" of straight knitting. It took darned near all the yarn in the skein. It's a simple sock, but given that it's recipient is male, I think that is a good thing.
It's been far too long since I've updated the Family Sock Challenge. Thank you to the participants who have kept sending me updates! I really didn't mean to go without posting about it for so long. Hopefully, with the fall approaching and with major medical issues behind us, I'll be better at getting back to a regular schedule on this.
Since I last posted, there has been a bit of activity. It seems like summer is a sleepy time for knitting, even sock knitting. I'm pretty much there myself! So thank you to Michelle, who finished a lovely pair of socks for her Mother-in-Law at the end of June, and sent along a picture that I could share with everyone.
Carole has also been busy on socks. She ">finished a pair for her sister-in-law from some very nice hand-dyed yarn. (For the spinenrs amongst you, Carole's blog is always full of spinning eye-candy an I recommend that you trip on over there and take a look if you have a moment.). She's also started a new pair of socks for her stepdaughter.
Meanwhile, Wendy's finished up a lovely pair of socks for her stepmom, Mary Jo. These socks got some lovely photographic treatment at a pier. Surely they are happy socks indeed!
I've been puttering away at my own projects. I finsihed up the Broadripple socks for myself (leaving me with two more pairs of family socks before I can go on to new projects for me) and I've just gotten started on a simple pair of sock for my brother. I've found with guys, simple is best, so a well marinaded pair of Regia skeins came out of my sock yarn stash for the project. The Broadripples were the subject of my last post, so I won't provide an additional pictures.
So, here's the scorecard as of today... as always, you can click on the links to see all the socks being made out there for friends and family!
First of all, today we have hit a major milestone! We actually have some Family Sock Challenge finshers! Congrats to Maud (who completed 6 pairs of socks -- be sure to check out the Tilt socks she made for herself -- there's a link below -- they're gorgeous!) and Kristi (who also completed 6 pairs of socks -- you have to go click on the link for the Fancy Gentleman's Socks that she made for her sister) on meeting the challenge! Y'all are way out in front of me right now -- I still have two more pairs to go that are completely unstarted yet (although I did finish a pair for me, which I've decided counts just a little bit!)!
And there are still more socks. Michelle finished a pair for a good friend (yep, that counts! I have a few friends that are close enough to consider family) there's a link to the socks under the latest entry under her name. The cute kid picture alone is worth the click! Michelle seems to be surrounded by cute kids. Janna completed a pair for herself that is also part of the Six Sox Knit-A-Long in a very lovely Koigu colorway (as always, link below Janna's name) and is taking a little break before she gets back into the thick of sock knitting. And, last but not least, Carole is getting started on a new pair of socks for her sister-in-law -- and by the looks of it, also having some very fun fiber adventures!
As always, you can check out everyone's new (and old) socks with the links under their names. Those folks that are finished will have a ** ** around their names. It's really a lot of fun to see how much people can accomplish. I mean, hey, 71 socks in 6 months. That's almost 12 pairs a month. Certainly the world must be a better place for that!
Et Voila! Finished Opal Rainforest Tiger socks. This is just a modification of my "standard sock" pattern to create some extra calf shaping. Other than that, it has a standard Dutch heel and 4-pt decrease toe. The "special detail" in this sock is that whenever two black stitches overlapped, I purled the stitch instead of knit it, giving the sock a raised texture on the outside when a black stripe is formed. Because of all the shaping, this resulted in some stripes on the calves that I think do look very tiger stripe-ish. No attempt was made to make these socks identical, and, honestly, I'm not sure that there's a real obvious repeat region in this yarn.
These socks are my fifth pair of finished socks for my Family Sock Challenge (John got 2 pairs, my sister-in-law got a pair and my dad got a pair). How about that? Only two more pairs left to go. But I'll be finishing those Mermaid socks for myself before tackling any new pairs.
Happy Father's Day to everyone out there who is a great dad or has a great dad (like I do!). We're heading off to Ann Arbor to spend the weekend with my folks. I wish a good weekend to everyone else out there, too!
9 New pairs of socks have come into the world since my last report. Y'all are putting me to shame as I move slowly along on the second sock for my mom (now that the K2 P2 ribbing for the second sock is complete, I should be moving along more quickly).
This time saw socks from a whole bunch of folks. Carole finished up some beautiful lacy socks for a wonderful friend (yes, I think friends can count as family!), Heatherly finished a pair of cashmere socks for her mom (lucky mom!) , Julie was particularly busy this month and finished both a pair for her grandpa and a pair for her aunt, Michelle K finished up a colorful pair of socks for her mom, Nathalie squeezed in a pair for herself (knitting for yourself is definitely fair game, too, since I'm sure you're a part of your family), and Wendy finished up a very special pair of Trekking socks for her sister. She was working on these socks when her mother passed away due to MS.
To Wendy, on behalf of myself and the other sock challengers, I just want to say that I am deeply sorry for your loss. You're definitely in my thoughts right now. I wish you peace and good warm memories of your mother.
To everyone else, I'd like to mention that there is a way to help support MS research and make sure that scientists and doctors can do more work to make sure that this terrible disease affects fewer people in the future. A very excellent blogger and friend, Claudia, is going on a very big bike ride to raise money for the National MS Society. She's already raised over $10,000 with the help of many fiber folks out there and has set a new goal for $15,000. If you are looking for a good cause to support, this is an excellent one. Having worked in a lab myself, I can tell you that $10-$15K or more can make a big difference in a research project. Sometimes it only takes one simple experiment by just one person to create a breakthrough that can make someone's life better. Supporting the MS society is a great way to give researchers a chance to make those breakthroughs happen! So please consider clicking on over to Claudia's Blog and clicking on her fundraising button.
Want to check out all those new socks? Just click the links next to the dates for the finished projects.
You might be thinking, right about now, what happened to all the socks?
And, in fact, I've been thinking something along those lines, too. What's up with my current sock project?
Well, over Mother's Day weekend I took my all but Kitchenered Opal Rainforest Tiger sock to be tested out on one or Mom's feet. Surprise of all surprises, math does work the way you expect it to sometimes, and the shapely Tiger sock fit exactly the way it was supposed to fit. So I grafted the toe and brought this sock to completion. I think it's about time I cast on for the second one now, don't you? Especially with a long weekend by a little lake in Michigan coming up.
The second sock I was going to work on was the second sock in a pair for me, the Mermaid socks from Lucy Neatby's Cool Socks, Warm Feet
And, apropos of nothing, I just had to put my little Gingher Stork Embroidery Scissors
Hi All! Sorry that I haven't posted on the Sock Challenge in a while. I was out of town for the last two weekends (MS&W on the first weekend and on Ann Arbor for Mother's Day to see my mom on the second weekend) and wasn't able to put the post together. I'm also going to be out of town (and probably away from an internet connection) next weekend as well, but hopefully I'll get back to regular posting in June.
At any rate, three cheers for Michelle K, who has finished two pairs of socks since my last post -- you can click on the links under her name to see what she's been up to -- and Carole, who finished a very nice pair of socks for her self in a lovely yellow/orange color as part of Project Spectrum -- click on the link for her "Cheez Whiz" socks to check them out!
I've been a bit slow, but things should pick up now that I've had the chance to let mom try on her first Opal Rainforest Tiger sock (it fit almost perfectly for her, which I was worried about because she doesn't have "standard" size feet.
Without further ado, here's the run down:
