Blueberry Socks

I finished my sweetie's socks about three weeks ago and I felt like the second sock was much better than the first. I was beginning to understand not just how to follow the pattern, but also why I was doing certain things when I was. The trouble was, I was certain that if I just merrily went on my way to other projects, then I was definitely going to forget everything that I had just learned. With that in mind, I decided to knit a second pair of socks, this time for myself.

But I wanted the ribbing to extend down the foot... and I wanted cables down the side too.

I sat in bed one evening and did all the math in my head (at 52 stitches around how large the cable would be and how many repeats of ribbing there needed to be on either side of the cable so that it would still split evenly when I reached the heel). Happy with myself, I got started the next day and wrote down my plans. Only later did I discover that what I had come up with was nearly identical to the Cable Clock Socks on p104 of Ann Budd's Getting Started Knitting Socks! I just don't have the extra cables around the cuff and my cables are at regular intervals (every 6 rounds). Oh well, I know that I came up with it in my head.

Here is the finished first sock, completed last night:


However, I went out on my own when it came to the toe. There were several things I didn't like about the toes on my first pair of socks. Mainly I thought they were too pointy and came down to much too small before finishing (only 8 stitches). That last little bit of the sock would just get stuck under my toes and would bother me to no end. Plus, my feet are not exactly typical in shape. I realized that my first three toes are nearly the same length.

Finally, if I followed the method of toe decreases as described in the book, the lovely cabling pattern would be the first thing to disappear!

So instead I decreased through the ribbing pattern, and I only decreased on one side of the sock. This will require making a right- and left- foot sock, but I am happy with that.

You can see how neat the decreases are in the ribbing on the toe. Now, you might ask why I should care so much about the toe? Why, because these will be my sandal socks, where the toes of my socks will be displayed in all their beauty. Now all I have to do is make sure that I mirror all of this correctly in the left sock...