Goodbye Socks, Hello Soleil
I’ve finished my Broadripple socks plus a pair of baby socks. Now I’m ready to make my tank top!
I finished my second Broadripple sock last week and it went much more smoothly than the first one. As I had mentioned before, I started knitting the first sock quite tightly. This was evident when I finished the second sock since I had fewer rows with the same size sock. It turns out that I don’t love the look of these socks. I picked this pattern since I thought it would be interesting to knit. But they are the perfect socks to wear to bed in the spring or fall. Since Cascade Fixation is such a stretchy yarn, these socks fit like a glove, but are not too tight anywhere including the cuff. I think the cuff looks a little weird with the scalloped edge. So I’ve been turning the cuff over and I like how it looks much more now.
Our neighbors had a new baby last week and I thought that was the perfect opportunity to use my leftover Fixation yarn. I typed in “Baby Socks” and “Fixation” into Google and came up with a simple and FREE sock pattern. I love the Web. The pattern used two sets of circular needles instead of double point needles, another opportunity to learn a new skill. Two days later, I had these lovely baby socks. I made the shorter version. Hopefully by using this yarn the socks will stay on the baby’s feet but not be too tight. I even have enough yarn left over to make a second pair of baby socks.
Now with the socks done, I could finally get to my Soleil tank top that I’ve been so excited to start. Webs didn’t have the recommended yarn, so I went with a different mercerized cotton, Classic Elite Yarns Provence in the Portland Teal color. And I love that the yarn is on sale now at Webs. I’m about 3/4 of the way through the lace pattern and haven’t made any big mistakes yet. But I’ve been so compulsive with placing the stitch markers and counting my stitches after every lace section to make sure I haven’t messed up. Tedious, but I haven’t had to back up more than 10 or 20 stitches.
Since this is my first big garment, I’ve been so anxious about getting the size right. My expectations are probably too high. I’m going to put all of this time into knitting the top, I want to be able to wear it and have it look good. So in hopes to stop my freaking out, I’ve been reading two knit-a-longs, Knitty.com’s message board and Soleil-Along. From these resources, I know the pattern is a little short for most so I’ll be adding some extra rows before I start the decreases. And I’ve discovered the top is supposed to be pretty low cut. I’m still trying to figure out if that’s going to be a problem or not. But I really hope I can finish this before our road trip mid-June.
