Not Short on Shortie Socks

Ready for one more pair of shortie socks? It's been a summer full of them!

The very day I cast off the last pair, I cast on a new pair! I found one ball of self-striping yarn in the stash, and got started. I quickly realized that my usual short-row toe was not going to give the best results with the stripes. (If by "quickly" you understand that I knit the toe and then had to take it out.)

So I tried a more common toe that starts at the tip and increases to the full width of the sock. I started with 12 sts (on each needle, 24 total), and quickly increased to 22 (44 total) by increasing one stitch on the right and left of the sole and top every row. Then I increased every other row to 32 (64 total) stitches.

Six days later, I was casting off the first sock. Or almost casting it off. I had started the sock right where the yarn changed from blue to grey and wanted to start the second sock in the same place. Well, I only had five stitches left on the bind off and only had about 2 inches left of blue. Not enough to cast off five stitches and leave an end to start the next sock.

I was stumped for a minute, but then noticed the other end of the ball was dark blue so I used it for the last five stitches. Makes a couple more ends to work in, but I had preserved the colours. Later I noticed that I could have used the tail at the beginning of the sock too. It was longer than normal (and of course blue).

I then cast on the second sock starting at the same grey/blue colour change and hoped it would match the first. This would depend on knitting it the same as the first sock, keeping my tension the same, and the yarn being dyed consistently over six repeats (three for each sock).

And guess what! It worked!

I think I had to make a slight adjustment when I went around the heel to keep the colours the same but it's hardly noticeable.

I made the heel turn a little different, making the short rows from short to long instead of long to short and I didn't like it.

There are little bumps from the short rows and they end up on the bottom of the sole instead of at the edge of the heel. I can't feel it while I'm wearing them but I prefer the look of how I normally do them. Now I know.

I finished with a 1x1 rib. It's a little shorter than I would have done but, as noted, I was constricted by the yarn stripes.

Totally worth it!

I love the muted colours of this stripe. This was a ball of yarn my sister found at a second hand store and passed on to me because she wasn't knitting socks at the time. Then later when she got into socks again, she knit a pair with the same yarn!

These are a little small for me which is a good sign that they will fit the person I'm giving them to. :) At first I was confused about why they were small because I did the usual number of rows before doing the heel, but then realized the new way I did the toe is fewer rows than my usual toe. That would do it!

Project Stats
Started: 22 July '19
Finished: 5 Aug '19
Pattern: none (improvised); toe-up, gusset, heel flap
Materials: Patons North America Kroy Socks Ragg Shades (in Blue Stripe Ragg), 45 g
Ravelry project page: Grey self striping shortie socks