In Which the Pirate Knits With Handspun.

A note: the full-size pictures are lots clearer than the thumbnails. Click to see!

I hadn’t gotten very far when I realized that without ribbing, the sock was going to be way too large at 72 stitches, so I horrified my onlookers by blithely tearing out the work I’d done and beginning again. Fortunately I got it right the second time, and now I’m knitting my standard 16-loop, 64-stitch toe up sock. I tried to explain by saying that I hated doing gauge swatches and that instead I just knit the toe as a swatch; if it fits then it fits, and if not then I can tear it out and try again. Better to start over than to have a beautiful sock that’s too large for my foot, right?

The socks are warm and soft so far. Even the spots where the yarn was a little overtwisted seem to be all right. I hope they wear well and don’t felt too badly on my feet!

I really enjoyed having so much free time to just sit, knit, and socialize with people I only get to see once or twice a year. While there’s no way I could ever meet a “52 pair plunge”, in which really fast knitters manage to churn out a pair a week for a full year, I could definitely knit a pair in a month if I really put my mind (and all my free time) to it. But then, I’ve got other things to work on as well, and knitting so constantly on top of 40 hours a week at a computer would probably destroy my arms. Still, I admire anyone who can stick to it!