Better Blue

Another FO report.  These are the Blue Ridge Motif socks, from SoXperience, by Edie Eckman.  (If you go to the SoXperience link, scroll down to the photo of several socks in early progress.  Mine’s left front.)  They were knitted for Mary as a very belated birthday present.  While the colors were such that I knew several of you would LOVE them, I knew instantly that these socks were the reason I hadn’t been able to settle on what to give Mary for her birthday.  You see, Mary lived in Virginia for a while, so it’s all the sweeter that she now has her own bit of the Blue Ridge Mountains in the desert with her.  She’s also been my crochet coach, so it was only fitting that she got the first even partially crocheted item that was worth giving away!

Pattern:  One Edie handed out at the workshop, but it’s basically a VERY standard top down, stockinette all the way sock with a heel flap, and a motif sewn in via picking up and binding off stitches.  I was sorely tempted to try the alternate motif placement on the heel flap, but as I knew before I finished the first cuff that I was making these for Mary, I stuck to the pattern.

Yarn:  Claudia does an exclusive each year for SoXperience, it would seem.  The watermelon colorway from last year is back at Carodan, for those who missed it.  I love this yarn; Tofutsies, watch out!  You might be displaced by the local (ish?) dyer whose soft yarn with colorways often named after local stuff is a pleasure to knit with.

Needles:  Size 1, after a frogged #3 attempt.  I used the Addi Lace, and I’m not a fan, not at this size.  Maybe that put a hole in your hand tip is appreciated in a larger size, but I truly feared Sissy would take an eye out when she was near these things.  It’s been replaced with a Hiya Hiya #1, and ooh boy!  If you haven’t tried these needles, you’re missing out.  They’re truly the perfect circular needle, but a review will come another day.

Hook:  Wee doggy!  My first efforts with anything smaller than the H hook, I think, and I jumped all the way down to a D.  That’s about as small as I care to go.  I will mention that there’s no hook for me like the Boye hooks.  There’s something about the head and the throat shape that are just right.  Hooking with them is effortless, and considering my very novice skills, that’s saying something.

I’d been waiting for Mary to receive her socks before I blogged, because I didn’t want her asking more questions, and I wasn’t in the mood to fib about where yet another knitted gift really went.  Today seemed right, because my last post was indeed rather blue, and that’s not the way I want to leave things, not on a day of celebration.  Not on a day when the President’s helicopter (what do they call that?  Birdie One?) was making Sissy nutty.  (Yes, I also live close enough to Monticello that we all heard the bird flying not so high in the sky, twice.  He’s left the area, in case anyone cares.) 

I’m spending my National Holiday knitting, as planned.  I’m actually going to finish the I’ll never tell project today, I do believe, so I’ll have lots of time to spend on the baby blanket my Ravelry notebook says I want to finish by July 15th.  Or, I’ll have time to cast on something else…

Happy 4th!