Yarnification

Look, I finished the first sock—many, many thanks to everyone who was cheering me on while I worked on it!

I hope you will not be struck blind by the terrifying paleness of my leg. I will still be that pale in August. I have learned to live with it.

I’m still working out how to get decent photos without the sun washing them out. I probably need to read the manual that came with the camera.

I went back and watched the ssk videos at knittinghelp.com per Dawn’s suggestion, and sure enough I was doing the ssks wrong all along. I was sticking the left needle through the back of the stitch instead of the front. The toe decreases are infinitely better-looking than the gusset decreases on account of I actually did them the right way. The toe is slightly wobbly where I did the grafting, but Kitchener stitch was another first for me, so I figure that’ll go better next time.

I used the sock recipe from Knitting Rules and didn’t change a thing other than using size 3 needles instead of size 2 because I knit and crochet more tightly than most people. Maybe I’m just wound a little tight? I’ve learned from experience to start with a needle one size bigger in knitting and a hook two sizes bigger in crochet because the recommended size is pretty much always too small for me. Still, I was much relieved that the sock turned out to fit well—I was halfway convinced I was making it too big.

How long did that take? Less than a week? I thought for sure it’d take a few weeks to finish the first sock. Now to cast on the second one…