Warm, fuzzy....

Socks.  I find them comforting.  Which is why I am making a pair for a friend of mine who is ill and far away - it's my way of sending comfort when I can't be there in person.  I had the idea to make her a pair of what I call "bed socks".  You know, the kind of socks you wear to bed when your feet are cold.  Only, I wanted them to be the softest, most comfy socks I had ever made.  The lovely folks at one of my LYS's helped me find a really wonderful yarn: 

 The price sticker is right smack over the name of the yarn so I'll tell you ~ it's Heaven.  Seriously, that's the name of the yarn.  It's 100% Nylon, which isn't my usual style but I wanted to make them out of something that could be just thrown in the washer.  I thought at first that I could just use the multi-gauge sock pattern from Anne Budd's book, The Knitters Handy Book of Patterns, because I use it all the time with great success for a variety of yarns and feet.  Well.  Apparently, not this time.  The gauge was off the chart (on the low end of the stitch count) and I just couldn't get my act together enough to do the math to figure it out.  This brought me back to the same LYS to ask their help in finding a pattern.  Did you know that sock patterns for bulky weight yarns are few and far between??  No?  Well, neither did I. 

 After a lot of looking (and another book purchase, just because I couldn't resist it after following a false lead.... more on this later....)









we finally came up with Sirdar pattern number 9354 for Sirdar Big Softie yarn http://www.sirdar.co.uk/searchresults.

     

I really tried to make it work, but Heaven just wasn't cooperating.  The gauge was off and, no matter what size needles I tried, I couldn't get it to come out right.  So, back to the proverbial drawing board.  I gave in and ordered Big Softie yarn.  Yeah, it's pretty soft, but not as soft as Heaven and I will admit to some disappointment.  It's knitting up nicely, though, and behaving.  Funny how that happens when you use the yarn that the pattern is designed for: 

The needles feel huge in my hands ~ it's knit on two size 15 (US) needles.  Most of the knitting I've done in the past year or two has been on size 0 - 4 (US) except for the Schulana scarves, which are on 6's (US).  The up-side to this is that it's going quickly.  The down-side is that my hands cramp.  I don't know if it's from the weight of the needles but that's my suspicion.  At any rate, I finally have the heel turned:

The strangeness of knitting socks on two needles stays with me when I am working on these.  I am used to 4 or 5 needle socks and don't really understand why they wrote the pattern for two needles.  It seems to me that it would have been much easier to just go ahead and use regular double-pointed sock needles and knit them like regular socks.  But, I didn't write the pattern, I'm just knitting it.  I am, however, glad that I have lots of experience knitting socks because it certainly helps
                                                      while

navigating this pattern.  As soon as I have something that more clearly resembles a sock I will post more pictures.  In the meantime, it's late, I'm tired, and so I'm saying goodnight.  Sleep well, dear readers, and I hope your feet are comfy while you do.