Knitting on the Road
Like many people, I’ve had Nancy Bush’s book, “Knitting on the Road” for a while and have not yet knit anything out of it. So the new KOTR knit-along is a great motivator. It will be an ongoing KAL where we knit a pair of socks every two months using a pattern from the book. Last week, we voted on which sock to knit and “Friday Harbour” came up as the final decision. Here’s my start:
I’m using some yarn that I dyed in a crockpot with washfast acid dyes. Being “Friday Harbour”, I was going for a kind of watery theme. Ah well, it’s an excuse to knit up some stashed yarn. Besides, it seems incredibly difficult to find the recommended Mountain Colors Weavers Wool in Vancouver.
Rather than use DPNs, I’m using my Addi circs (3mm) for magic loop again. I just put stitches from needles 1 and 3 on one side of the loop and the stitches from needle 2 on the other side of the loop. The chart has so far been easy to follow and it’s working itself pretty quickly — it’s only 49 stitches around now.
Oh, and here is another sock I knit on Friday: my first toe-up, short-row heel sock in my very own handspun!
I chose a skein of the craziest, most barber-poled handspun and used Wendy’s Generic Toe-Up Sock pattern for this. It’s all 30g of yarn knit up. I used a sewn Tubular 1×1 cast off for this (see Katherine Buss’ Big Book of Knitting — it’s fabulous)… but mainly because when I first cast off normally, I couldn’t get the sock on my foot!
don’t you just LOVE this pattern! do you find that 50 st cast on a bit tight? i added 10 stitches to mine. the hand dyed sock looks fabulous!
I love the crazy rainbow sock!
i am SO getting that knitting on the road book! i love that sock!
your handspun sock is fantastic! it looks just like the ones in the twisted sisters sock book.
I love your sock out of the handspun! It is gorgeous!
love your blog!! always inspiring… i have seen Mountain Colors Weavers Wool at Knitopia in Whiterock - a large basketful.
I have EXACTLY the same problem with my toe-up sock! It languishes on the needles, mournfully making cottonmouth sock puppet grimaces at me. So pleased to see a tubular bind off solves the problem - so I can give my lonely sock a friend.
Love love love the crazy handspun sock! It looks great, as does Friday Harbor, but in a much more understated way.
Beautiful new socks. I love the one with your handspun. Gorgeous!
Both socks are absolutely gorgeous! I especially like the Friday Harbor yarn…it’s just lovely.
Sounds like you are a Vancouverite! Where do you like to buy your yarn? I’m always on the look out for shops to check out.
Wow…I’m just learning socks and these are amazing. I would go so far as these socks are why I wanted to learn how to knit socks…
I have looked at the “Knitting on the Road” book before and thought that the patterns looked okay but you make the Friday Harbor sock look like an absolutely to-die-for pattern! You’ve got a great color choice and beautiful craftsmanship!