A Pile of Socks

I've been knitting away on Sock Madness again this year. Don't know if I've mentioned it or not, and if I spend time looking at the very few blog posts I've done this year to find out if I'm restating myself then I'll probably run out of time to post at all.

I've managed to make it through 4 rounds so far, which is further than I've made it any other year that I participated. I owe my success to Jeff for helping to watch Max, and my competitors that kept cheering me on when I almost got knocked out during round 2.

Round 1 was a sock knit sideways, flat instead of in the round, and then seamed together to make a tube. After that the toe, heel, and cuff are knitted on and wah-lah you have a sock!
This resulted in vertical stripes on the sock that contrasted with the rings on the bits knitted in the round. It was a new technique for me, and even though it was kind of fun, I'm not really keen to try it again right away.

Round 2 was colorwork. I don't think I've ever had more fun knitting a two color sock. Something about the pattern just felt good in my mind and hands as I worked. In case you can't tell from the picture they are covered in coffee beans, and you KNOW how I love my coffee. The funny thing was that I think it took me a week to knit the first one and only two days for the second.

Round 3 was just fast. The bright sunny colors just sang to me after all the blues I'd been using. The pattern stitch was super easy to memorize, and it didn't seem like I had to work very hard at all to finish this pair in 5 days. The heel construction was a new one for me, and I really like how they look.

Round 4 was nuts. I've never knit knee high socks before, and I don't know if I could have every finished them if I weren't racing against 14 other people to finish the round in time to continue in the competition. For the most part they are just a plain ribbed sock, but there's one large cable motif on the outside of each sock, and swooping decrease of the ribbed portion on top of the foot. It's going to be a lot of months before I can wear these, unless it's freezing when we visit Iowa this summer, but you have to admit they are impressive.

That's it for now. We're going to start round 5 sometime next week, so I might have something else to show you soon. I hope this post makes sense, but it was written while Jeff was watching robot chicken, so if anything is complete nonsense blame him.