Crochet socks, the finale

Ta-dah!  Finished socks!  In all honesty, I have some mixed feelings about them.  Some is from the nature of the sock, some from my execution, but all around, I'm fairly pleased with them.  They are very warm, mostly fit right, and look pretty.  In a nutshell, the things that were just me:

• I should have used a slightly smaller hook.  Oops.
• Despite careful measuring, I managed to make the cuff both slightly too big and shorter than I wanted.
• I should have left a longer tail when I started - it would have made the seaming bit go much more smoothly.
• This is actually something I did right... but crochet socks fit better with less negative ease than one would normally build into a knit sock.  Probably because the stitches are more textured, and while it is just as stretchy as my knit socks, the more you stretch any fabric the more the stitches start to feel like little pebbles in your shoe. 

The main not my fault issue with these socks is the texture of the sole.  They do not feel like knit socks!  It's rather like walking around on one of those foot massaging mats that used to be so popular.  Some people will love it, some people will hate it.  I have mixed feelings about it, and actually rather prefer them inside a shoe to just walking around in socks, and have a definitely preference for the single crochet portions (the heel and toe) over the crunch stitch portions.  Advantages?  They are extremely warm, much warmer than socks knit with similar yarn, and really not that much thicker (they are still perfectly comfortable in my sneakers).  They worked up very quickly, and that included a lot of seaming.  A crochet sock in the round would be even faster.  Crochet as usual has it for pretty but easy to do stitch patterns - I liked what the crunch stitch did with my variegated yarn, and it was pleasantly mindless.

So, in summary, I like my crochet socks.  I will probably wear them frequently.  But I haven't decided yet whether I want to do it again.  What I think I REALLY want is a way to make a sock with a knit sole but a crochet instep and cuff.  Which I will have to think really hard about.  Maybe my Ravelry-fu is lacking, but I can't find any such pattern.  Sigh.

Crochet socks some more

Well, I decided I didn't like the sc ribbing after all, so I frogged and started over.  BOO.  The good news is I'm most of the way finished with the toe, and have to say that these are some ingenious socks.

They're really curly at this point, so I had to kind of pin them down to get a good picture.  But seriously, clever right?  That's the whole cuff, the top of the foot, and the first part of the bottom of the toe.  So the seams go up the sides of the foot then up the back of the cuff, where there's less pressure on them.  Neat!

Gratuitous stash flash

While I'm talking about All For Love of Yarn, I just had to pull out my stash of Angela-dyed fingering weight.  Mmmm.

Clockwise from the top, those are her Nogi, Soleful, Resplendence, and Opulence bases.  You've also seen her Lublu base... it's what I'm using for my erstwhile crochet socks.

Wait, why am I talking about this again?  Um... Opulence has cashmere in it?  Weekly theme?  I suppose I just felt the need to take pictures of pretty yarn.  I don't do that very often, as it cuts into the time I could be knitting/crocheting the pretty yarn.  But sometimes it's fun.

Crochet socks

Picture does not do yarn colors justice.

Remember when I talked about these?  It took me forever to get past the swatch!  As you can see though, they are coming along at a halfway decent clip.  I have already made an alteration tho... front post/back post ribbing looks nice, but it isn't stretchy the way single crochet ribbing is.  I'm looking forward to seeing how these fit.  I have wide ol' duck feet, but dainty little ankles, and had just resigned myself to socks being loose at the ankle, but it's looking like I'll be able to have socks snug all the way up with these.  Also?  The colors in this yarn are way fun.  I'm glad I'm using it for my crochet sock trial, as I don't knit vanilla socks very well (they bore me, frankly).  A complicated stitch pattern would get lost in the pretty colors.

Socks!

Crochet socks!  This is hilarious but I, who has crocheted all manner of things, had not thought it possible to crochet socks.  It never occurred to me.  Well, maybe bed socks.  Slippers for sure.  But real honest to goodness fits in your shoe socks?  Seriously, go search Ravelry for crochet socks right now.  I can wait.

See?  So, here's my question, my blog minions - have you ever crocheted a sock?  Did you like them?  Did they fit in your shoes/boots?  (Because in all honesty, the reason I'm interested is I need boot socks.)  If not, I am going to try it.  The pattern I have selected is Origami Turkish Socks (because hey, if you're going out of your comfort zone, you may as well go ALL the way!).  I will tell you how it goes... but right now, I have samples to knit, as well as a very, very belated birthday gift for my brother to finish.  To finish on that note, learning to do magic loop on two at a time trigger mittens was a BAD idea.  When I finish them they will stand as a testament to the fact that I do actually like my brother.