cwBlog

From a post I made to the Knitlist on June 27, 2007:

In my case, I'm not quite on a yarn diet, but if I don't pay
attention I will buy yarn compulsively, because it is pretty and not
because I need it. My rules are - (1) No buying anything unless I
have a specific project in mind for it; (2) For each pair of socks I
finish, I can buy one more ball of sock yarn; (3) Anything hand-spun,
hand-dyed, or otherwise unique, anything on sale for more than 50%
off, or anything I see on a visit to a new or non-local yarn store
can justify an exception to the former two rules; (4) anything goes
at the Webs tent sale, the Webs year-end sale, and Rhinebeck, at
least until the credit cards are declined.

Such reasonable rules!

I have many favorite sock yarns -- because I have many favorite styles of sock!

I have a love-hate relationship with Schaefer Anne. I love the yarn, but it is so fine that I need to knit it on 1.5 mm needles. (That's 000 in US sizes.) So it takes me a lot longer to make a pair of Anne socks. On the other hand, I can make a pair of socks in my size and still have plenty left over from a hank, so I don't need to worry about dividing it in half and knitting toe-up.

I like Opal and Regia self-patterning yarns. It seems to me that Opal is a bit smoother and Regia is a bit rougher, but they both make good socks. And Opal (even though it doesn't say so on the label) wears like iron and is machine washable. I don't like all the colorways, but I think both yarns come in a broad enough variety that I can find colorways I like.

I like Austermann Step; it's a bit splitty to work with, so I have to pay more attention. I think I like the socks, too; I made myself a pair, and somehow they seem to find themselves on someone else's feet more often than on mine. So someone likes the socks, which is good. They do require special care: the yarn has aloe and jojoba infused into it somehow, which means that you can't wash them with fabric softener.

I like the hand-dyed yarns that Ray Whiting (http://www.knitivity.com) produces -- beautiful, rich combinations of colors. The base yarn he uses is a little bit splitty, but not that much more so than Austermann Step, and the colors are rich and permanent -- I've probably washed one pair of socks from his yarn 15 times, and it's still just as brightly colored as it was the day I finished knitting it.

All of these are great yarns for plain St st socks - the sort of socks I keep in my shoulder bag for when I'm on the bus or train, or when I have to wait in line somewhere. No complicated patterns, stuff I can do from memory.

But I like more complicated socks too....

I like Briggs & Little Durasport a great deal. It's a rustic single-strand yarn, 20% nylon (or thereabouts, maybe 15%, maybe 25%, my memory's not perfect) that's not heavily processed -- you will be picking bits of grass out of it now and then. It's very well suited for colorwork socks (though their Sport line, which is 100% wool, comes in a much broader range of colors). It's also quite good for Aran or cable knit socks. I have tried lace socks with it, and I think it's a little too fuzzy to get good stitch definition.

(I've also found that the B&L Heritage and Regal yarn lines, 100% wool in a 2-ply yarn, are an almost ideal for Aran sweater knitting.)

I also like Bartlett Sport (http://www.bartlettyarns.com) a great deal. It's a two-ply, light sport weight or heavy sock weight yarn. It comes in one-pound cones, so it's a bit of a commitment, but the colors are so rich and heathery that it's an easy commitment to get into. It's great for colorwork socks. It seems like it should be great for Aran socks too, but I haven't tried that yet.

And I like Tongue River Farm icelandic sock wool. (http://www.icelandicsheep.com) It comes in a variety of natural colors - a cream-colored off-white, a rich brown, a cool grey. I've knit a colorwork sock in two natural colors, and it is beautiful and warm and soft. I want to try this yarn with icelandic socks too.

So I guess I'm just incapable of being faithful to one sock yarn.

(a post I made to the Socknitters list on 27 December 2007 in response to a question about "what is your favorite sock yarn?")

I have a favorite favorite sweater -- it's store bought, but it fits perfectly, and it's 100% wool. It is the sweater I measure to make sure a pattern I want to knit will fit me.

For years I took really poor care of it. Each spring I'd just fold it in with the other sweaters and sweatshirts (putting away dirty sweaters BAD), and I took it to the drycleaners in the fall before I started wearing it (drycleaning BAD). Last spring I thought, you know, this is my favorite favorite sweater, I should take better care of it. So I hand-washed it in Eucalan and carefully packed it away in an airtight box for the summer. And when I took it out two weeks ago, I found five moth holes.

The @#$% moths ignored the stash and the several other (less favorite) sweaters in the vicinity, and went straight for the favorite favorite sweater. No sign of moths in my second-favorite sweater, which was packed and stored the same way.

You can't win. Do the best you can, and hope, and when that fails, there's always duplicate stitch.

(From a post I made to the Socknitters list on 16 October)

Many people get different gauge when they knit than they do when they purl, because they do them at different tensions. Usually, if there is a difference, the purl tension is looser. When you knit a St st swatch flat, you alternate a row of knitting with a row of purling. When you knit a St st swatch in the round, you are always knitting. If you're one of those people who knits and purls at different tensions, your gauge in those swatches will differ.

This is also the reason that some people recommend the first stitch on a dpn should always be a knit stitch: there are enough tension issues at the end of needles that starting the next needle with a purl stitch will only cause more problems.

This is not universal: some people, either through luck or practice, knit and purl at the same gauge. If you aren't sure whether you do or not, though, the only thing to do is knit a gauge swatch and see, and in any case you should be aware that knitting flat and knitting in the round can have different gauges.

(From a post I made to the Socknitters mailing list on 4 October 2007.)