A couple of months ago I was looking through my stash and I noticed that I have heaps of partial balls of sock wool of between 30 to 50 grams. Now I need between 70 to 90 grams for a pair of sock so these partial balls were no good for a full pair of socks unless they were striped or used as contrasting colours for heels, cuffs and toes. Clearly, I am not opposed to a stripy pair of socks but it seems silly if that's the only way out of a partial sock yarn ball situation.
Then, I had a great idea. What if, instead of striping the socks, there was a six or eight-row transition between the two colours? That way, it not only would keep it interesting, it would mean the transition could be anywhere.
You could do the cuff in colour A, a transition stripe in colour B, back to colour A for another transition stripe and so on and so forth. The world is your oyster and it's multicoloured and filled with partial balls of sock yarn!
What a brilliant idea! I could design this sock and sell the pattern. If I use a short-row heel then the pattern can work either toe-up or top-down, maximising every bit of scrap yarn. It was serious genius. It would change the way that people approached their stash!
Then, I hit a snag. Firstly, it's a real pain in the arse trying to design six or eight row transition patterns that don't create long floats. Next, I realised that if I did design this sock I have to write it up. Writing up patterns is hard. Then I realised that if I did succeed in designing and writing up the pattern and sold it to a magazine, I would have to knit multiple samples in multiple sizes using different types of yarn. I don't want to do that!
When I realised that while knitting my prototype pair despite having knitted at least 100 short-row heels in my time I'd managed to mess the heel up on both of the socks into a discussing hole-y poorly fitting mess, I decided to throw in the towel.
I'm going to leave designing to the designers and this pair of socks in an unloved pile. Anyone want a pair of vaguely Christmas coloured socks with a poorly knitted heel in size six? They're all yours.
The vital statistics
Yarn: Paton's Bluebell and Bendigo Woollen Mills 5ply crepe.
Needles: 2.75mm
19 down, 12 to go.
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