Cursed Pink Socks

[firstfrost]

I have never had a project I have felt such conflicting feelings about. On the one side, this is a very clever, well-crafted pattern. All the pattern segues (ribbing/body, body/toe, body/heel) are real segues, not just "Stop one pattern and start the new one". The calf is wider than the ankle, which means adjusting from a seven-stitch-wide pattern to a six-stitch-wide pattern, no mean trick. And there's a trick for the heel flap I've never seen before, which is totally brilliant. On the other side, the beading was a real pain - I've only beaded lace before, which is much easier. I probably should have used larger beads. The pattern uses size zero needles, which are a little fiddly for me, and also kind of fragile - I accidentally broke a needle twice and had to replace it. Between these issues, I started manufacturing reasons in my head that I didn't like the pattern (travelling stitches that have the decrease and the increase on different rows! How terrible! The K-YO-K increase sometimes leaves a hole and sometimes doesn't - well, that one is true.) and ended up not working on them for months. But I finally decided it was silly to let an inanimate object beat me in emotional combat, so I started working on them again, and then RAN OUT OF YARN AT THE SECOND TOE. Cursed, I tell you! But Ravelry is the best thing in the world, and I pinged a couple of people who had made projects with the same yarn, and one of them sent me her leftovers. It's a different dye lot with more dark bits, so the change is visible, but that just makes the socks not match, which is what shumashi likes anyway.

Comments

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/twinkling-trellis-socks

(Basically, you make the "pick up" stitches while you're doing the heel flap, so you don't have to pick them up later. On normal heel flaps, they never want to come out even, and I often also get holes at the corner of the gusset, but this seems to avoid that too.)

[remcat.livejournal.com]

Hm I just did a pattern like that ... Papilionoidea? It was cool not to have to pick up stitches.