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I was planning to post today more about the sock design but now that I get started, what’s coming out is more scattered than usual so let’s do this post listicle-style.
Andrea Rangel has been writing over on her blog and you should go take a look. She has a nice post explaining talking about what is a checklist of birds. Plus, some behind the scenes from our photoshoot.
One of the great features of these socks is the ribbing along the back of the leg. It adds that extra stretch to help the socks hug your ankles nicely.
See the amazing gnarled wood in this image? We went down to the beach to take photos and there was this fantastic tree right there. In terms of the photo shoot telling a story, I’m not sure why our model/hero is up in a tree without her shoes on. But in terms of wanting a cool tree in the images, I know exactly why she’s up there.
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Andrea used short-row heels for this sock design. If you prefer a standard heel flap (or the toe-up Fleegle heel) you can of course substitute that because you are the boss of your own knitting. But the reason Andrea went with this type of heel is because of the self-striping yarn. A standard heel flap has a gusset, where there are temporarily more stitches around the circumference of the foot (picked up along the side of the heel flap), which are gradually decreased towards the toe. It fits most feet quite well, which is why it’s so popular. But the extra stitches eat up yarn faster and cause the stripes in that section to be narrower. That is not how we do it around here. We don’t painstakingly plan out this entire thing only to have two stripes be narrower, no siree. So, short-row heel it is.
Having just said that I won’t stand for narrower stripes in one area, I absolutely would knit a heel flap for my own personal socks if I felt like it. And you should do what you want for your own socks too. But for the pattern? Even stripes.
This yarn is dyed so that one half of the skein is self-striping and the other half is the contrast beige yarn. The toe, heel, and cuff are knit from the beige half of the skein and, importantly, are added whenever/wherever you need them. It means you’ll have a handful of ends to weave in, but it’s worth it.
You don’t need a map to understand normal yarn, but this is unusual yarn. And our customers tend to be thoughtful, clever folks who like to plan ahead. So we made a map. You can either wind the yarn into two separate cakes before you start, or wind into one big cake and pull yarn from both ends.
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The yarn is available in the Gauge shop. Andrea has the pattern for sale on her website and Ravelry.
I titled this post “there’s a bird for that”, which doesn’t make a ton of sense. But I want to tell you that we were at Knit City a couple weeks ago and Mandy and I were trying to re-arrange yarn on the grid wall after the first day. The goal was to fill any gaps and make the wall look pleasing and full despite having less yarn. It might not sound like a difficult operation, but it’s awkward because you want to keep similar colourways grouped together and pay attention to the overall look of the wall. Plus, you don’t want to start from scratch, you want to quickly build on what’s already there because it’s Saturday at 6 pm and you just want to go back to the hotel and eat. You remember there being risotto on the menu and when was the last time you had risotto, that would be a nice starchy way to end the day. Anyway. We had done a great job with the wall but there were three or four empty pegs. I made the executive decision to fill any holes with Checklist bird yarn. Like, little cozy nests tucked almost invisibly on the wall. Got a hole to fill? There’s a bird for that.
Now that I’ve told the story, I’m not sure that the title makes any more sense. But I sure did have fun thinking “I’ll just stick a bird in it. Problem solved.”
A close-up of the heel of a sock.
This shows how the yarn is dyed in each skein. Half the skein is self-striping, half is the beige contrast colour. From top to bottom, these are Checklist, Steller's Jay, Northern Flicker, Anna's Hummingbird, Varied Thrush, Mallard, Great Blue Heron, Rufous Hummingbird, and American Goldfinch.
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Dyeing yarn and knitting things. Stories from Gauge Dye Works.