I promise to post lots of holiday knitting ideas in the coming weeks. I know that I don’t have the time that I thought I would have for gift knitting, so I imagine others are in the same boat. Given the recent success with my father’s birthday socks, (yes, I knitted during the opera, even picked up a dropped stitch in the dark, no one kicked me out or scowled at me, had the socks done in two days and 12 hours of knitting) I have decided that sport weight socks are one solid and simple way to get a holiday gift together on the fly. Here is what I did:
Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino – 1.5 skeins of green, 1/2 skein brown (this means that you can knit two pairs of socks using three skeins if you switch the main and contrasting color for the second pair)
US #3 circular needles (2 sets) or a set of US#3 double points
Using turkish or figure eight cast on and the contrasting color, cast on 22 stitches and work two rounds even. (fewer for a women’s sock)
Begin increasing for the toe: Knit through the front and back of the first stitch of next round, the 11th and 12th stitches and then the last stitch of that round. Essentially, you will be increasing twice on each side of the toe of the sock.
Then work one round even.
Work increase round again. Repeat these last two rows until you have the desired sock width or until you have 54 stitches (for a men’s 9.5 size shoe).
Switch to the main color and knit in the round until the sock is approximately 1.5 inches from the desired foot length or until it reaches the point on the foot where the leg and foot join. (see photo, ignore mess in the background)
Begin short row heel with contrast color. For full instructions, download my simple sock pattern from the sidebar on this blog page.
After completing short row heel, continue to work in the round (stockinette stitch) with the main color until one inch from desired height and then work 2 stitches in main color, two stitches in contrast color for three rows. (creates the subtle fair isle pattern on the socks shown above).
Switch to contrast color, breaking main color yarn, and work in 2×2 ribbing for rest of sock. Cast off loosly using US#7 needles.
There you go! Should take an insane knitter about 12 hours of time and a “normal” knitter about 15 hours of time.
I promise an update on my purchases and other exciting bits from Stitches East when Olga returns my camera to me:)