With the arrival of more sunshine and spring flowers,
we're delighted to announce that we have a new, seasonal mini art print
going out with our Etsy Shop orders as a free gift!

“The sun just touched the morning;
The morning, happy thing,
Supposed that he had come to dwell,
And life would be all spring.”

- Emily Dickinson

 
Also, we've been collecting up bits and pieces of art that we created over the past year, and we're so excited to announce that this new collection of four mini art prints is now available in our Etsy shop!⁠
⁠
Inspired by different birds from each season, each art print features a small quote from a poem or classic book.⁠

- WINTER ROBIN -

"The robin is the one
That speechless from her nest
Submits that home and certainty
And sanctity are best"

by Emily Dickinson

- SPRING BLUEBIRD & WREN -

"New feet within my garden go –

by Emily Dickinson

- SUMMER SANDPIPERS -

 "The rippling sea has a sweeter sound
As the up-flashing spray glistens brightly around,
And the wild forest bird in his home 'mid the trees
Warbles rapturous lays as its glory he sees."

by Louisa May Alcott

- AUTUMN SWALLOWS -

“True hope is swift,
and flies with swallow's wings.”

by William Shakespeare

This bundle of mini art prints can be found HERE

In my last sock knitting post I mentioned that I had been drafting a pattern for a pair of nautical themed, colorwork socks. 

 It took a couple of tries to work out some of the details, but I *love* the final results,
and I thought I'd walk through how I got to them!

 

For this pair I used Woolike by Loops and Threads in the colors navy and beige. 

(I used yarn from my stash, but it looks like a lot of the Woolike colors have been discontinued and Navy is no longer available at Michaels.)

 First things first, I knitted a gauge on size 3 US dpns.

 My gauge came out to:
8 stitches x 12 rows = 1" x 1" square

 After making my gauge, I was then able to figure out how many stitches I needed to cast on based on the finished circumference I wanted, and taking into account the stitch repeat from my whales and waves chart. 

So for this pattern, I needed to cast on 96 stitches.

Because colorwork knitting is not very stretchy, the cuff needed to be wide enough to slip over the heel, but tight enough to stay up on the leg.

What a  dilemma! I ended up deciding that it was better a bit loose,
than to risk it being too tight to fit over the heel. 

After the whale chart was finished, I worked some decreases and switched to a 2x2 ribbing to help tighten the sock back up so that it would (hopefully) stay on the leg better.

Once the leg was finished, I used this sock knitting recipe to determine how to split up the stitches for the heel and gusset.

For the first version I made a striped square heel, and used short rows to turn the heel.

After picking up the gusset, there were so many stitches I needed to decrease by 4 stitches on every decrease round instead of by the standard 2 stitches, or else the foot would have ended up way too long.

 Instead of taking in both the decreases side by side, right before the instep (the instep is the top part of the sock), I decided to experiment and took one decrease by the heel and one by the instep on each side. 

 When a few rounds of decreases had been worked it was time to start the color work for the octopus. 

On this pair I worked the chart across the instep, and floated the white yarn around the rest of the sock, catching the floats every 3 or 4 stitches until it was time to work the color again on the next round. (I should have taken a picture of the inside - It looks like a white sock down at the foot! 😆)

This method allowed the underside of the sock to be a solid navy on the outside, however,
it has very little give and stretch because of all those floats.

Then I finished this pair off with a striped toe and the kitchener stitch.

My thoughts on how this pair turned out:

I love how the design looks visually with the striped toe balanced against the striped heel. However, I was a little concerned about the elasticity of the octopus portion of the sock. I was also disappointed with how my gusset experiment ended up turning out.

So, after reading through "Socks from Around Norway", and making the "Halling Socks" (you can see how those turned out here), I decided to re-work my nautical socks and give it a second go!

The Second Pair

Again, I used Woolike by Loops and Threads, but since I had run out of navy,
I went with black and teal instead.



I cast on the same number of stitches, and worked the cuff exactly like the first pair.

I thought it would be nice to add a little texture to the 2x2 ribbing,
so I cabled the knit stitches every fourth round.

And this is where things got a lot different!

 

Instead of carrying the blue yarn around the inside of the foot, I used the same technique that the "Halling" socks used and alternated between black and blue on the underside, always making sure to end on the color black before working the instep.

Then I finished up with a solid teal, star toe.

 

 

Just for fun I did a little knitting math
and estimated that each sock is made up of about 12,000 stitches.

 

Since this pattern was created with my Jules Verne loving brothers in mind, I've dubbed them the "20,000 Stitches Under the Sea Socks"

🧶🌊🐙🐋

Hopefully y'all enjoyed my knitting rambles! If you've made it this far, I'd love to know which pair of socks are your favorite down in the comments below. 😊