Wednesday 27 July 2011

WIP Wednesday- The socks of indecision

I have three current WIPs, but I will only talk about one as the others are my YOP Hemlock ring blanket and my poor neglected sock yarn blanket, which get their own posts. Instead today I want to share the socks of indecision, and maybe you can help me decide.

This is a truly terrible photo, but here they are:


The back story- I had nothing portable to knit, and 6 hours of sitting around at the weekend. So, aiming to be super organised I grabbed my Christmas sock yarn supplies, some needles and started a simple (but fairly boring) K3P2 rib sock for my Dad's Christmas present.

I had trouble deciding how many stitches to work over, but settled on 60. This will teach me not to make proper notes on the previous pairs! (can you see where this is heading?)

6 hours gets lot of sock done, in fact almost a whole sock when it is a simple pattern, see picture, it is obviously the one on the right.

I was feeling a little iffy about the sizing, since I had done a short row heel it looked a bit tight around the top of foot/front of heel bit. When I got home I tried it on a handy male foot of about the right size (a clean one I should add). The report from the wearer was that it fit fine, but to my mind the ribbing looked way too stretched out, to its maximum, which doesn't leave any potential for washing shrinkage.

Here are my options:
  1. Frog the whole thing, restart with a bigger stitch count (70 sts)
  2. Frog the whole thing, restart on bigger needles (3.5mm)
  3. Frog back to the start of the heel, work a heel flap
  4. Put a toe on it now, keep them for myself/gift them to a family member with smaller feet, buy more yarn and make bigger socks following the the changes in 1,2 and 3
As you can see I couldn't decide, but as I needed bus knitting yesterday I started the second sock anyway over 60sts, which would leave me free to do option 3 or 4.

I am leaning towards 4, I do hate to waste all that knitting, and I would get some boot socks. But it does mean spending my (limited) yarn budget on more boring brown 6 ply rather than heavenly pretty indie lovelies.

What do you think knitters of the interweb? Help me choose an option. And if you have any tips on sizing giant man socks I would be very grateful.

11 comments:

  1. Hmmm, tough call, I can see why you can't decide! I know what you mean about hating to waste the knitting, but weigh that with the things you want to spend your yarn budget on - would you rather spend the extra time to reknit and have the money for prettier yarn, or spend the money on less fun yarn but not have to knit. Toss a coin, whatever the outcome of the coin toss, you'll know what you actually want!

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  2. Have you tried blocking? It's possible it could grow, and if you use sock blockers of the right size for the recipient maybe they'd stretch it without the sock looking overstretched. I haven't actually tried this, but blocking does work magic sometimes :)

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  3. Option a or b, I think. But I don't knit socks, so my opinion is of no value whatsoever :)

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  4. I'm too lazy to re-knit a sock completely. I'd probably finish it and gift it to someone else, or keep them for myself. :)

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  5. After doing this with a Cardigan I made for Hubby only to find out I had followed the wrong size in the pattern! I landed up giving to my Dad and then making Hubby another one.

    My choice would be gift them or keep them! And redo for Dad.

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  6. i'm in awe of people who knit socks so I'm not much help.

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  7. I have a hard time reknitting a pair of socks. I would finish this pair up, and find a worthy wearer to gift them to. Then start up a new pair with the proper specifications.

    Good news though, another excuse for more yarn!

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  8. Unfortunately I'm not a sock knitter but I usually gift projects that come out too small or too big.

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  9. I find short row heels are usually too tight; I much prefer a (longer) heel flap and gusset. I'd go for ripping and making a larger sock on 70 stitches or so. The ribbing scrunches up a lot, so it's sure to fit no matter what.

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  10. It looks great and doesn't make sense to frog. I say continue with it, put a toe on it and either keep them or gift them to someone else. Then go with 70 (or 72) for your dad's socks.

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  11. That is a tough one! I hate to frog, so I understand why you'd want to keep it, especially since it's practically finished. If it's easy to get hold of more brown you might as well keep it and knit another pair with 70sts. Plain ribbed socks make for perfect travel/TV knitting, and you've got plenty of time to get it all finished for Christmas!

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