sock knitting season 2017 - pyroclastic socks

I am back to sock knitting. My second pair just came of the needles and my third pair is coming along nicely

I optimistically started with the cuff of this sock, with a vague idea of "making something a bit different". What that might be did not become clear until a bit later. That's me. I looked through my own patterns and decided that I didn't fancy any of them. Then I went on Ravelry, which again didn't inspire me, too many too similar socks. Eventually, I chose a pattern published on Knitty. The pattern is the pyroclastic sock, which was published in the Knitty winter issue 2009. It features a faux cable with a whiff of lace pattern repeat, which is easy to memorise. The sock also has a shaped arch, which is something I have never made before and a new to me heel flap. The sock has a ribbed cuff that neatly flows into the cable pattern. I guess this is where the name comes in, pyroclastic, as in pyroclastic flow. Having already made a cuff, I didn't bother starting over.

Despite the simplicity, the pattern nearly defeated me. Can you see how the cable/lace pattern gets narrower and narrower on top of the foot, ending with an equilateral triangle on top of the foot? It made me really cross. Let me explain. The arch shaping involves making two stitches on the sole side in alternate rounds. To maintain the stitch number, two decreases are done left and right of the cable pattern, thereby creating the triangle. The pattern instructions said to maintain the cable/lace pattern between the two decreases. I took this literally. Alas, anyone with a little experience at wits would have noticed very soon this doesn't work, the result being a botched triangle. I considered pretending this is what is was meant to look like but then thought I'd never manage to mirror botch the second sock. There was some cursing and unravelling but it was worth the effort in the end. What the instructions should have said that the same amount of stitches needs to be maintained on each side of the centre stitch in the centre cable at all times, making it necessary to fudge the cable pattern a little here and there as I moved towards the centre. If you ever decide to knit these socks, keep that in mind! If you like the pattern but not the faff, you could always just knit a regular not shaped foot, avoiding triangles and tears and whatnot.

I used Fyberspates CoopKnits Socks Yeah! yarn. The shade is benitolite, which I assumed was a mineral because all the colours in the range have a mineral name (malachite, topaz etc). Ever so curious, I set out to find out what it looks like. I found out that benitolite does not exist, it should be benitoite, as established by Dr Google and Wikipedia. It is a rare blue barium titanium silicate mineral, in case you are wondering, quite close to the shade of the yarn but more radiant. I guess calling it medium blue would be boring but I like boring, everybody knows what medium blue is*. I rather like the yarn, it smells like (washed) sheep and is soft. There are around 20 shades, all very nice.  

Anyway, the socks are cool, I like the arch shaping and the sturdy heel. Mind you, when my socks wear out it is usually on the ball of the foot, never the heel. Overall, I enjoyed knitting the pyroclastic socks. The pattern was just interesting enough to keep me going. I get easily bored with socks, it is a marvel that I ever make a second one. At the moment, I am sock knitting in the evenings, catching up with several Netflix programmes. For my current sock, I am going back to one of the first patterns I ever used, the Monkey sock by Cookie A.

It was not easy to photograph the socks, the colour is elusive and some of the features are difficult to catch without the flexibility of Mr Iyengar. I asked Annie to model them but her feet are a different shape from mine and we ended up bickering about the most beautiful feet in the house (mine). 

Right, I can smell my toad in the hole and it is time to round up the troops for dinner. Just me and three kids tonight. Richard is out for dinner and Sam is washing dishes at a Chinese restaurant. I assume he actually means scraping food of plates and piling them in the dishwasher. Have a lovely weekend. Thanks for stopping by and saying hello. xx

* just had a flash back to a post in the distant past, where I was mulling over different shades of blue. I am more accepting of the haphazard naming of colours now.