Two Toe Tuesday: One of These Socks is Not Like the Others

I've not been talking about socks very much lately, and for good reason--I've barely been working on socks at all. Or much of anything else, really. I'm knitting a little bit here and there, but I've also been working on Christmas cards and shopping and (believe it or not) running 3 or 4 days a week. I've still got a lot to finish knit-wise before the holidays are officially here, but I'm trying not to get too stressed out, which means I'm just getting further and further behind.

So what about these socks? Two are a little alike, because they are they are both knit from Shelridge Farm's soft touch heather, and both are knit from ribbed Nancy Bush patterns. However, the Yarrow rib, in green, is gi-normous, being knit for a man. And the Spey Valley socks, in purple, are a few sizes smaller than my feet, being knit for a woman with smaller feet than mine. I love both of these socks, and need to get cracking on sock #2 of Spey Valley. Sock #2 of the Yarrow rib is just about ready for a heel, so I should power through that as well.

The third sock has not made an official blog appearance yet, although I started it in July. It's still on the needles, because I wanted to make sure that I end up with socks that are the same height and use as much yarn as possible. The yarn is Yarntini self-striping sport, in Blue Hawaiian. It's great yarn (I've used the semi-solid before, and love it), with great colors, but I don't like this sock. The heel is a standard short-row heel, and I hate it. I think that it has to do with the weight of yarn more than anything else--even though I picked up the wraps, the turns look messy and I don't like the way the heel interrupts the stripes. This is why it took so long to get to the heel--I was thinking about using a heel flap pattern, but I have less experience with those. And I really needed to get past the heel, so I would have a nice plain sock to knit at the movied. Bad reason to rush through, and I'll probably just rip it out. The stripes would make a really cute hat, wouldn't they?

Hope that everyone's holiday preparations (such as they are) are coming along well. I'm hoping to get my knitting / blogging mojo back in the coming weeks, and I keep seeing projects that I'd love to take a crack at once I've finished up some other things (but keep me in mind if you have any recommendations).