I’ve finished a pair of socks! I had such high hopes for these…I started them in April and was determined that they would be finished by the end of May…and then the end of June…and then they flew 30,000 miles with me as I visited Australia and New Zealand…and it still took me a few months after I got back to finish them off.

However, I did and I am proud of my achievement, as they are one of the most reworked pairs of socks I’ve ever made…

Hope Socks

I cast on shortly after returning from Edinburgh Yarn Festival, fresh from the success of having used the Ribbon Socks pattern in one of my books to make a pair of these in hand-dyed yarn I received in a Secret Santa swap. (Speaking of which, I have no idea where they are. Hmm.)

These socks were super comfy, incredibly beautiful, and absolutely dreamy – but for the fact that I forgot about negative ease, and probably should have knitted them slightly shorter than I did. I decided I would knit my next pair of socks with a shorter foot.

This worked well in principle…until I turned the heel on the Hope Socks, started on the cuff, then tried them on. They didn’t fit – in fact, they were even bigger than the Angel Socks at this point. There was nothing for it – I ripped back down and started again, trying them on more regularly to make sure that didn’t happen.

What I haven’t mentioned here is that there was a four month hiatus between these two events. I realised the foot was too long, then carried the project around with me in a project bag for months and months, intending to modify it but always feeling too weary to do so. They travelled to Australia, New Zealand, four weddings and several folk festivals before I finally sat down and concentrated on sorting them out.

I finished them a few weeks ago, but have only just got to blocking…and I’ll talk about that when I review the yarn, because I was aware that there could have been a problem with colourfastness, so I wanted to test it properly.

The yarn I used was Biscotte and Cie in the “Hope” colourway, on 3.25mm needles. (And yes, I did swatch!) I split the yarn into two and knitted the socks toe-up two at a time, in the hopes of getting the very most of out my yarn. I had 7 grams of my 50g left when I finished, and although I could have done a few more rounds of ribbing, I liked the length and left them at that.

I’ll talk about the yarn in more detail next time – but for now, there they are finished!

Much love,

Corrie xx