FO: Back to Basics

So, it's only about a month late, but the Back to Basics socks I made my sister for Christmas are finished. I bound off last night.

I went to my parents' house this evening to give them to her. She was cooking with her boyfriend, and she had me put them on her feet because her hands were dirty. She liked them, and she thought they were soft. However, they were a little big, as I had feared.


You can see the bagginess on the right foot. It's even more pronounced in this picture. However, she didn't seem to mind the bagginess too much. (And if I had gone a needle size smaller, they would probably be too small.)

I used South West Trading Company TOFUtsies in "Foot in the Door" 725 and US Size 0 aluminum dpns. I translated the pattern for a set of five dpns. (The pattern shows you how to knit them on two circulars.)

TOFUtsies consists of wool, Soysilk, cotton and Chitin. It doesn't have the elasticity of typical wool yarns. I think my gauge would have been fine in regular wool. The good news is that it seems like nice and breathable. Also, the yardage is excellent. I have enough left to make a sock for Heather Mills. (I'm going to hell for that one.)


They look really weird off the foot because the increases are mostly on top of the foot, not to the sides like regular socks.


Her boyfriend needs a pair too.

Playing Catch Up

Here is my current WIP, Knitty's Back to Basics socks in South West Trading Company's TOFUtsies, color 725, "Foot in the Door."

And yes, these socks are my sister's Christmas gift. And yes, I gave her a partially knitted toe to unwrap. The good news is that she likes the yarn (as I suspected she would.)

I'm still catching up from the holidays and Jules' trip. I had didn't knit or crochet much. I missed having something to work on, and it put me "off my game" for a while. These socks had frustrated me at first. I started with US size 000 dpns (the size I had used for previous socks in a similar weight.) It was actually too tight. So I started again with US size 0. Then I thought it was too loose. Then I couldn't find my US size 00. Then I ran out of time and just wrapped what I had.

(My previous journalism professors would be so proud of those last three sentences.)

But then I realized that US size 00 would probably be too small. However, given the low elasticity of TOFUtsies, I was worried about them being too baggy if I knitted them on size 0. I finally settled for US size 0 and made some real progress.

The basic concept of this pattern is inspired by Cat Bordhi's new New Pathways for Sock Knitters, which I got for Christmas from my parents (as well as a gift certificate for The Knitting Nest.) I'm looking forward to exploring her architectures.

In other news, I have a sweater planned.

The day Jules went back to California, Hill Country Weavers was having their biggest sale of the year. I went to console myself, and I was pretty proud of my selections. Instead of buying a little of this and a little of that like I normally do, I bought a sweater's worth of yarn.

I found the Araucania Atacama (left) over in the "blue house" next door to the shop. They sometimes open the house up for sales and special events. During this sale, the house was where they set up all the clearance yarns, which were marked down more than the the rest of the shop. It was a good deal for 100% alpaca. This is color 503

Berroco Ultra Alpaca (right) is one of my all time favorite yarns now (I need to post a recent FO that I made out of it.) I could only find one skein of this particular colorway, 6259 Beet Root, with no label. Fortunately, the staff was able to match the color with their sample book and get more skeins out of storage for me. It was a good thing, because the other shades of purple didn't quite match the Atacama.

I've decided to knit Candy from Knitty. I fell in love with the pattern after discovering this version while listening to the Stash and Burn "Sweater Love" episode. (There is a better picture of the sweater here.

I think the Austin Meetup is planning a "sweater-along" starting Thursday. (I saw something about it on Ravelry.) I think it's the daytime group that I can't attend, but I'll probably cast on with them anyway.

Speaking of meetup, I'll have more coming up on their recent yarn swap, as well as pictures of the fiber festival, more FOs, my buys for the handmade pledge and my new year's resolutions.

In the meantime, I'm slowly uploading pictures from Jules' trip to Flickr. You can see what I have so far here.