Last night Susan and I got together (it was after all Tuesday and therefore a TAFK evening), and I had asked her to review with me the Turkish Cast-on we had learned in our Saturday Toes-Up Sock class. Oh – I didn’t tell you about that! Yes – we took a great class last Saturday with Christine Turnbull at Wool-tyme, had a blast and learned all about Turkish Cast-on’s and short row heels and toes-up socking knitting! We had a blast and may have acquired some more Aeroquipa for a personal pair of toes up socks to commemorate the experience!
Arequipa 207 0608-207
light browns & olives (mine has a lovely rusty orange in it too!!!)
Anyway, by Monday evening I had promptly and completely messed up both the newly learned cast on and the short rows and was once again at a complete loss. This is not the fault of Christine and in no way reflects her terrific teaching abilities, but rather my inept short-term memory! So I asked Susan to save me from myself, and review the technique with me. A very good note-taker, that Susan is! No problem, I was only missing a very small (but obviously very important) step and I was back in business. However we both agreed that the holes left by casting on both this way and the subsequent MI increases, were rather less than desirable, and we both had difficulty with tightening the loops after the fact, and so we set about to figure out a better way. Yes, we amateur’s could surely do better than the great knitters gone before us! (snort!) Still we thought we’d give a try!
In a fateful intervention that could only have been the Knitting Gods finally showing me some small mercy after last week, I had quickly grabbed and brought to Susan an extra copy of Interweave Knits Summer 2007 that I had noticed I had (do not begin to ask why I had two!). As she began leafing through it, she started laughing and pointed to the cover – without looking I had grabbed the very tutorial we would need for our task ahead – A Better Sock From the Toes Up! Fate, I tell you, simply fate!
It was very quiet as the two of us perched on opposite cushy couches, and studiously knit and ripped, knit and ripped, knit and ripped. Comparing results lead to more discussion, and we settled in to our chosen challenges; Susan was working on tightening the M1’s and I casting on over and over.
By the end of the evening we felt we were really on to something. The first change we made was to abandon casting on the Turkish (or Figure Eight) Cast-On and to actually use the very similar Eastern (or Middle East) Cast-on also found in the tutorial - no figure eight crossovers, means less yarn, which means tighter cast on loops. Right? Good start here, but still the holes were very apparent and I was casting on as tightly as I could! There was a very real fear that Susan’s bamboo double points would snap!!
After some more trial and error, I jumped down a full size needle from 3.5mm to 2.5mm just for the cast on round. The theory was that the tiny loops used on the cast on would create only tiny holes. That could only be better! Then we decided that we would do the first round as a knit round but jumping back up to the 3.5mm to take up any further slack leftover from the cast on. Bingo!! Worked like a charm! A very, very acceptable cast on row, with almost imperceptible gaps, ready for toe increases.
Susan did us proud! She tried all manner of increases, liking the results of twisting the bar increases as she went, tightening it up, but not the enormous work needed to accomplish the manoeuvre, and finally settling on M1B (make on in back loop) rather than M1 (make one in bar below) which produced a stellar toe. The only flaw seen working on larger needles and DK weight yarn, as I was, but not visible on smaller needles and fingering weight that Susan had, was the lack of mirror image increases on either side of the toe. I think it is just a matter of trying some version of right and left slanting increases and this too will disappear.
At the end of the evening we were very proud of our accomplishments, working together and coming up with, well, a better sock from the toes up!
Next stop, what to do with those short row heels, which are easier we agree, but we both like cushy heel flaps in our socks! And before that there’s those gusset increases to contend with! I see another evening of knit and rip, knit and rip, knit and rip. Ain’t it great!
Knit on………..
PS. Apparently the Gods in charge marriage jewelery are not done with me yet. My broken ring(s) saga continues. My wedding ring that I had repaired not two weeks ago (when the anniversary ring was examined for the same problem before the opal fell out!) is now missing a claw. Back to the jeweler!!! Grrrrrrrrr…………..
PSS. I rather like this toes up sock I found here: http://www.knittingjenny.com/red.htm
Nicely laided out and like that after thought heel a la Elizabeth Zimmerman! Hummm.. might have found something I can sink my Arequipa into!
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