Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Bottletoe

I love handknit socks. Sometimes I knit them exclusively of everything else. They are portable, provide hours of knitting time, come in endless patterns, and are delightfully functional. But I'll be darned if the kitchner stitch doesn't slow me down something awful.



Swamp socks, Tofutsies in Gentleman's socks from Nancy Bush's Vintage Socks


I think it's because so much of my sock knitting happens while I am doing other things--sitting in class, socializing, thinking about life. I mean, I'll even finish entire pair of socks and it will take me as long to get around to the kitchner stitch as it took to knit the socks in the first place!



Pictures taken back when the grass was green. Takes me even longer to blog about how long it takes me to kitchner my toes.


Kitchner stitch takes my full attention, and since I don't have it memorized I have to remember to carry around instructions. Before I got my handy dandy dog tag with the steps, I was carrying around Ann Budd's hardcover Getting Started Knitting Socks every time I had to kitchner.


Patrotic sock in a superwash yarn I cannot recall


Since I've done so many kitchners and some serious grafting on a pair of handwarmers, I'm starting to get the hang of it and have achieved a level of proficiancy where I can talk to other people while executing the stitch, but I am not yet instruction free (and therefore grateful for the dogtag that weighs so. much. less. than the book).


Until that day, my undone toes will continue to accumulate in my knitting basket and stare me down.


Can't you feel the thousand little eyes and hear the haunting cry of "Kitchner meeeeee"? No? Then nothing to see here...

1 comment:

fecknom said...

Pretty sure the flag socks were OnLine Supersocke.

I've finally memorized Kitchener, somehow. In case it helps (which it probably won't), the needle goes through the front Kwise, Pwise, and reverse for the back. k, p, p, k. To start it, you only do the second half of each part.

But you can just kitchener them at home, and do it all at once, and be like Cory and have four new pairs of socks at a time.