Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Variations in Red

The Papal Conclave socks in Vatican Pie are coming along.  In fact, I can truly use the plural form of the word sock as one is now complete and the second is on the needles.  There will be SOCKS!  I may not beat the Conclave to the finish, but this is a good development toward completion of a pair, which is nice because I have two feet.

Last night, as I was coming to the toe of my sock, I veered away from the normal Kitchener stitch toe for a bit of flash.  I consulted my Nancy Bush book, Folk Socks, and put a star on the tip of the sock.  I tried to take a picture of the toe bling I created, but instead of showing off my stitch work, the sock looks like a snake.



I like it.  If I ever give up nursing for a living, I can become a sock puppeteer.

Over the past week I've shown you a couple of pictures of my socks and yarn that show off that rich red color.  What appears to be a completely saturated and solid red clearly is not once it's knit up.  This was such a surprise to me, but I'm enjoying my many faceted Papal socks.



I'm a little uncertain about yardage.  I wasn't worried until I started the foot of the sock, which seemed to go on forever.  I have big feet.  US size 10.  About 2/3 of the way through the foot, I took out my scale and weighed all of the yarn.  First I weighed the sock alone and then I threw the ball of yarn on the scale with it.  Together it came to 110 grams, including the needles, which don't weigh much at all.  The ball alone weighed  74 grams and I convinced myself I shouldn't worried.  There would be a pair of matching completed socks.  After the sock was done and I'd taken pictures of the snake, I weighed the finished sock alone at 54 grams and the remainder of the ball of yarn weighs 62 grams.  Combined they weigh 116 grams and no needles were weighed.  Apparently something is off and it may be the scale!

There are only two things to do...Pray for the Conclave and knit faster!

10 comments:

The Bug said...

Ooh I like it! Love the variegated color...

I'm in the middle of making what might be the ugliest scarf known to humanity. I'm going to finish that sucker & then put it on the blog for a vote - ha! Right now it makes me think of fungi :)

Gail said...

Sounds like enough yarn to me but I'm not good at math.

I'm always one of those gets half again as much just to be safe! I have many patchwork afghans...from the leftovers.

Celia said...

Looks like you have plenty of time, since they have voted twice and haven't made a decision.

NCmountainwoman said...

Just saw that white smoke is rising and the Swiss Guard is marching in. Better knit fast!

Stephanie V said...

Yes, knitting faster will work :)

Those socks are so wonderful and you may put one on and hop around. The voting is finished. I love those kids of yarns with many shades. So pretty - and happy.

Irene said...

You're very fortunate that you can knit your own socks. I knitted one in 3rd grade with cotton yarn and disliked doing it very much. I didn't learn a thing from it and it was all a waste of time. I'm sure Franciscus I would love to have a pair of your Papal red socks.

Alice said...

You've got until he actually installed as Pope, right?

I got US 11s, I used to try to get them run over by a wheelchair and cut them down in size! Never quite worked out though.

Jane said...

Why is it we always knit faster when we think we're running out of yarn? That sock looks lovely and warm, I do hope you get enough to finish the second

Darci said...

very beautifuL!
it always makes me smile when i see a new post in my reader from you, even though i am a terrible commentor

Larjmarj said...

Nice work on the socks! I've never tried that toe before. I find that with the standard toe my right sock always ends up twisting medially. Weird. I should try this.