Sock-complishment

Yee haw! My first pair of socks are done! Well, they are actually the second pair of socks I've knit, but the first pair was for my husband. These ones are all mine!

(Thank you to The Mafia for her fine photography skills during our morning coffee break/gab fest/WIP show-and-tell session.)

Project Specs:
Yarn: KPPPM, not sure what color number -- as always the ball band and the computer are not near each other.
Needles: size 1 clover bamboo
Gauge: 8.5 sts/in
Pattern: my own, combining the toe techniques from Wendy's free toe-up pattern, the heel from Denise's cybersocks pattern, and my own leg shaping.

Thoughts on the finished product:
I give these an A-/B+. Yes, that's wishy washy, but the perfectionist in me can't stand any grade that starts with anything other than an A. As one friend says, "even your blood type knew it had to be A+, or you'd ask for a transfusion of something better".

I like the Koigu at this tight gauge, although I intended to knit at a slightly looser 8 sts/in. I often am loose on a swatch, and get tighter as I go. It has something to do with pulling the yarn tighter at the place where 2 DPNs meet. I think I just keep pulling a little tight for the rest of the row. But, the socks fits like a glove ... or a well-fitted sock, I guess. The legs are snug but not binding, as I added some increases in the calf area.

I don't love the heel, though. It is worked by knitting a "tongue" that sits under the heel, worked over 1/6 of the number of stitches used for the circumference of the foot. If I did it again, I would make that tongue over 1/4 of the original # of sts, for a slightly wider piece that would cover the whole bottom of my heel, rather than have the heel flap start on the bottom of my foot and then up the back of my heel. Wow, that sounds very confusing, but it's not ...

See the part at the bottom? I would make that wider. The heel flap would then be a bit shorter.

Any recommendations for a good toe-up sock heel that does not use short rows? I do like me a good gusset.

Also, I learned that while I like to fondle hanks of Koigu, the colors once knitted up don't wow me in the same way as the hanks or balls do. I think I might like this yarn better in a lightly textured pattern. Perhaps I will try that with my next Koigu socks, as I'm sure there will be more in my future.

One last parting shot ...


Tomorrow, the other FO, if I remember to take a photo!