lostpurl

I loved both these patterns from the first moment I saw them. Marguerite's pattern Shetland Lace Rib came out in July. I was not in a sock knitting mood. But I printed it out for the future. Marguerite has designed so many beautiful patterns. A good many are for children in the CIC (Children in Common) KAL. Her patterns are well thought out and balanced.
Shetland Lace Rib
The MagKnits pattern was published in Sept and I thought, ohhhhh another beautiful lacy sock.
Snowflakes
Both are beautiful and I can see them in a soft creamy off white merino. Or Regia Silk in an off white. Excuse me while I dither a bit.
I am going to chart both of the patterns. The person who once hated charts has become a convert.
I was thinking the new KnitPicks Superwash might work for either of these.
Last year when I did the Embossed Leaves pattern from Interweave Knits, I used a very soft non sock yarn. The socks came out well and I wear them often. But even though I live in clogs, the top of the foot is getting worn out. Just from sliding my foot in and out of the clog. I had a strand of yarn break. Thankfully the yarn has fuzzed up enough to keep the broken stand from unraveling. I secured it with a few stitches. I now treat this pair as extremely delicate. I would like to go with a more robust yarn, but finding a solid color in sock yarn is not all that easy. Most of the yarn companies are still in stripy self patterned mode. My daughter still loves them. So I have a fair bit of this type of yarn in my stash.
I have tried KnitPicks Essential, and they didn't thrill me. The yarn seemed a bit thin and scratchy. Of course it may wash up into socky wonderfulness.
If I don't start soon, Socktoberfest will be over and I will still be deciding on which yarn :-)
In an effort to secure my yarn I decided to go on a Yarn Crawl. We have 5 yarns shops locally. All of them sell sock yarn, none of them sell needles small enough to knit socks with. What the hell is that all about? Not only that, when asked about needles to knit the yarn with, I was directed to needles that were too large for the yarn. If this is ignorance, it seems to be universal. The ball band size needle is always too large. You can't knit a decent sock using Lorna's Laces sock yarn and size 3 needles. What you will end up with is a loose baggy tube. One shop owner offered that the socks would shrink up and I would be glad I had knitted them a bit larger. "Hello, dear lady. They are superwash, and don't shrink up." I shudder to think of the hapless first time sock knitters out there wondering what they have done wrong. At one shop I was told, I didn't want to use small sized needles because they would take forever to finish. Go up a size and the socks will be done in no time at all.
I realize that not every shop owner knows how to knit everything, but come on folks. This is the equivalent of taking your car into the shop for work and finding out the owner has no idea what a piston is.
At another shop I was told they don't carry sock sized needles, because people who knit socks (you weirdos out there) already have the correct needles.
So after five shops and a lot of frustration, I came home and turned on the computer and started my yarn search.
I really want to support my LYS and almost always buy books from them. So many of them seem to be missing the boat. It would be so much better to admit you have never knit a pair of socks and only carry the yarn. Or you don't carry the needles because there isn't much of a call for them. Those are honest reasons, and I can certainly live with them.