FO: Sans Argyle Socks

Oh, sigh. These were such a good idea:

They are the Argyle socks from Veronik Avery in her lovely book Knitting Classic Style. The beauty of them is that there's no colorwork to keep track of or get tangled or mess with your tension or have to deal with knitting the sock flat and seaming it, but everything colorwork is duplicate stitched on top of the finished sock. Genius.

Except I failed at the colorwork. I've done duplicate stitch plenty, but for very small expanses. Like the black faces and feet on these sheep.



Or like all the green bits on the Snail Mittens (which are still my favorite mitts):



But all the intricate criss-crossing on these socks got to me, and I realized after several tries that my stitching wasn't even close to being perfect enough to make these socks look like an arts and crafts project gone wrong. It made them look very, er, "homemade", in a really sad kind of way. My embroidery was too sloppy to be seen in public.

So I put down my darning needle and left these as it. They are plain, but warm and cozy and most people are a little horrified that I would knit my man a gift of socks that are a Cashmere blend (and handpainted to boot).



So here are the two colors I was going to use:



One thing I did learn was that it comes out a little more evenly if you use a thinner weight yarn. Even that wouldn't save them in my hands though.

I'm happy with them anyway. I knit them almost entirely while traipsing around Paris so they have lots of good memories worked in. Also, the yarn is wonderful- The Sanguine Gryphon Bugga in Autumn Tiger Beetle. It's a pretty good way to spoil anyone you might know. I guess that time will tell if this is a good sock yarn though- if the heels blow out after a couple of wears then I will turn sour on it faster than warm milk.

Also, I got this sent to me in an email:



He's pretty adorable, eh? Plus he's wearing a Snail Hat from my handspun (and a faaabulous scarf that was meant for mum, but I'm supportive of whatever he wants to wear). Smaller than adult sizes always confuse the hell out of me- I know babies and children have proportionally large noggins, but I never know how large. Lots of stretchy ribbing and maybe something that expands quite a bit seems to work better for me that trying to guesstimate inches. I think I even put a note in with the hat saying that I would knit him another one if it doesn't fit. I dodged a bullet.

Bitten by the Bugga

I made another pair of socks. Technically, they are not finished yet. Embroidery of sorts needs to be done. It may not ever get done.

It started out with a Skein of Sanguine Gryphon Bugga.



LOVE. love. love. It's dyed beautifully. The colors are amazing- it was really hard to capture the subtle shifts of dark greens in the skein. The color is "Autumn Tiger Beetle". It's a good, masculine color (not that I'm a fan of assigning genders their own colors or imposing stereotypes) and the cashmere/merino and almighty nylon blend screamed out for a special pair of guy socks for a special kind of companion.

I love the look of Argyle socks, but I dislike doing colorwork on footwear. Too much can go wrong and I've just not had good experiences with this in the past. So, instead of dealing with that, Veronik Avery came up with the idea to fake the argyle pattern with a background stitch pattern and duplicate stitch over that. So much easier. Especially when traveling. The pattern is from her book, "Knitting Classic Style".

I cast these on while on the plane, and knit through my trip with the socks on my needles.



It's nice to have a small, portable project when you are on the road.



I usually don't get that much done on a project when I'm traveling, but these socks zipped right along. Also...I didn't see any other knitters at all when I was there. Is this something people are closeted about? Is it a cultural thing? Or is it just not as popular there as it is in the US?



After a close encounter with a hater TSA agent on the way home (yes, you lovely beautiful person, The Rules say that I am allowed to knit on a plane no matter what crime against humanity you think this will lead to), I was able to finish these up with no issues.



Now all that is left is the duplicate stitch to fake the argyle stripes. I found what might be perfect colors in my scrap yarn pile. It might be sitting there in wait for a very long time.

They are cozy and warm and soft. The cashmere means a little bit of bloom occurred once I gave these a good wash. If they hold up well, I might go exclusive on this stuff.