FO Friday- O socks

Today is the turn of the O sock.

Pattern: Olympian socks
Yarn: Shunklies superwash merino (Etsy seller)
Needles: 3mm
Mods: short row heel, round to, adjusted lengths.

I absolutely love this pattern. It works up really quickly and looks impressive, but there is no cabling, it is all an illusion. I did change the heel as I am currently a short row fan, after avoiding them for the first 6 months of the challenge I am giving them a go to see how they feel when being worn.

Since the yarn was on the thick sock yarn side I chose a larger needle size, I am still a little undecided on my preferred size to use after my N socks ended up somewhat thick and felty feeling. Of course the proper answer is that it depends on the yarn, but I am generally trying to aim for a slightly looser fabric. Even so I still like a tighter fabric than many suggested sock gauges produce, I am not keen on gappy socks. Larger needles made the socks work up more quickly too.

The yarn colours is gorgeous, a turquoisey colour which has shown up quite nicely in the photos. It is lovely and squishy too, I am wearing them today and it is all good so far, hopefully they will wear well as I know a lot of knitters will only knit with yarns with a nylon content.

I would maybe have preferred a slightly longer leg, but I was a bit worried about having enough yarn, in the end I had leftovers so I could have added a couple more pattern repeats.

Stitch pattern close up:

The A-Z challenge is going well so far, but P will be a challenge as I have a busy week ahead, I have picked a simple pattern but it still might not get done in the two week time period I am aiming for.

Tour de Fleece day 20

More of the same, but this time the single is finished!

This is the second half of the superwash merino from Shunklies. I finished it this morning, mostly because there was absolutely nothing to watch on the TV last night (until Sherlock came on, which was super) so I got a couple of hours spinning in. I finished it this morning and will ply it on Saturday.

It is pretty thin, I was aiming for a sock yarn weight when the two singles are plied together but I still think it might be underspun for socks, until it is plied and washed there is not way to tell.

Tomorrow is challenge day. I have some Wensleydale locks that I am going to try and comb and spin (using a dog comb and drop spindle). This may go ok, it may be a total disaster, I think I might go and do a little Googling to see what other people advise.

Tour de Fleece day 18

I forgot to post yesterday (ooops). It was a rest day so nothing happened spinning wise but I was aiming to post every day. I caught up with some knitting and reading blog posts, so it would not have been an overly exciting day for you to read about anyway.

This morning I got up early so I could finish the first single of my blue superwash project. The fibre was taunting me yesterday, but I had planned to stick to the rest days and am determined not to break my self imposed rules on this one.

The first single is done. I think it is a little underspun so it will probably not be hardwearing enough for socks, it may end up as a shawl instead but I will see how it looks once it is plied.

During the tour I have managed to go from overspun to underspun, will I ever get the holy grail of perfect twist?!

I have just enough time to prep the rest of the fibre before I should get on with some work. Hopefully I will get some of it spun tonight, I still think I will not get this finished during the tour as I have something else planned for Friday, if not it should be done by the end of the weekend, next week there will be yarn!

Tour de fleece day 16

Another day with just a little spinning squeezed in so that I can keep up with my 15 minutes a day challenge. I am back from visiting family so the spindle project has gone into hibernation and I am back on my superwash merino wheel project.

There is a little more than in the photo on Friday, I managed about 30 minutes today.

Tomorrow is a rest day, I am hoping to catch up on reading some of the blog and forum posts about the tour and maybe get this single finished on Tuesday.

Tour de Fleece day 14

Today was more of the same superwash merino as yesterday, you can tell I have done some more because it is more blue today.

I have about 1/3 of the prepped fibre left then it is onto the second single. I think this project will take me to the end of the tour apart from the challenge day next Friday.

Tour de fleece day 13

I have started on my second big project for the tour, 100g of superwash merino from Shunklies. The colours are lovely greys and blues with just the occasional hint of purpley pink. This photo in no way does the colours justice-

I am using my wheel to spin a thin single, I have saved half the fibre and will make a second single to ply it with. Hopefully it should end up commercial sock weight, although it may not end up as socks- after trying really hard to master avoiding overspinning during the tour this may be on the underspun side, we will see how it comes out.