Saturday, August 27, 2011

Hello, my name is...

Hi.

My name is Heather.

I am addicted to knitting. Mostly knitting socks right now, but if it's not socks, it can be anything. It doesn't matter. I can get my kicks from knitting anything.

the goofed up heel

Remember this? That was what...two weeks ago? I made my first sock. And was in the middle of my second. Here is that second sock finished.

a little better... an afterthought round heel

This one turned out better. I was happier with it. I was able to make the toe, heel and cuff a contrasting color with a stripe of white between without any problems. But the sock itself didn't fit right, so I wasn't satisfied with it in general. The heel was interesting though. If I had to wear them, the "seams" might hurt eventually. So even though this was probably the easiest heel I've done so far, I probably wouldn't use it on a sock I'm going to actually wear. Unless I don't do the seams on the bottom.

Since I wasn't satisfied (am I ever?), I tried another style.

The Heel Flap heel

By this time, I was bored with knitting so much sock. I really just wanted to test the heels. So I did just enough above and below the heel to see what it felt like when I put it on. This time it was even better. At least I keep improving, right? That's the right direction! It fit better (I finally figured out how many stitches fit around my ankles), and the yarn felt SO much better than the orange and gray yarn. The mix of fibers was much more comfortable. This was a huge leap on the satisfaction scale.

Plus, I really liked the coolo neato pattern on the heel.

Eye of the Partridge heel detail

It's a kind of criss-cross pattern, making it a little sturdier for a heel. The pattern only called for it on the bottom of the heel, but it might be handy to have it on the back of the heel too.

I probably would do a heel flap pattern again on socks I would actually wear (the entire sock, that is).

I wanted to try more. I'm an addict, remember?

So then this sock came into being.

a Fleegle Heel

Since I was bored doing plain socks all the way up, I put a pattern on the instep. That at least made it interesting enough for me to get past the heel. But not enough to make it a very tall sock! By the way, this heel is the same heel that was in the sock with the weird heel.

same Fleegle Heel

That purple sock turned out ok. I didn't have enough yarn to do a matching one, though. But that's alright. The addict in me wanted to try something new anyways. I am now working on a new heel style.

boomerang heel

This one is a little harder. I've had to retry it a number of times in an effort to improve it. It has backward yarnovers, and I keep ending up with holes along that seam. Which I don't really like. I guess that's the perfectionist in me? The red marker is where I tried different stitch techniques to try to get rid of the holes, but it still didn't really work as well as I'd hoped. Either I have to learn to live with the holes (they're small, really) or I have to try it over and over and over until I figure it out. Practice makes perfect, right?

That may be true, but "perfect" is the enemy of "done".

I heard that on a podcast I listen to regularly. Garden Fork Radio. Isn't it a great quote? Perfect is the enemy of done. Well said.

So in an effort to finally have a pair of DONE socks, I might just learn to live with the little holes.


Right after I try it just one more time.


ugh...such is the life of an addict.


xxx

1 comment:

vkarhan said...

What are you going to do with all the "not perfect" "undone" socks?