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Welcome back to the Use Every Scrap Knitalong! How did you get on with your toe(s) last week? Today, we’ll be talking knitting the sock feet, and we’ll even glance toward the leg. Exciting times! Let’s dive in.
The General Plan
So you’ve completed a toe (or both, if you’re working your socks concurrently!), what next? Well, I’m happy to report that now you can sit back, relax, put your feet up (and daydream about the socks they’ll soon be be sporting) and just knit, knit, knit.
Warning: this phase of the sock can be fairly more-ish. If you’re knitting with a self-striping yarn, you’ll now get to see it really doing it’s thing (above is my Fab Funky Fibres pair in the I Can Dance colourway. It’s temporarily out of stock, but there’s plenty more FFF to delight in the online shop!) Just one more stripe, one more colour shift … it can be hard to put that growing sock down! And If you’re going the scrappy route, seeing how the remnants of socks past play together can get pretty engrossing. At some point though, you’ll want, you’ll need to stand up. Have a stretch, make a tea, get a snack … and when you do, take that opportunity to …
Measure Your Foot
Grab your tape measure and check your foot length, from the back of your heel to the tip of your longest toe. Make a note of it wherever you’re keeping your #UseEveryScrapKAL notes (you are keeping notes, right?) We’ll be coming back to this measurement next week when we chat about inserting our heels, but for now, all you need to know is you can carry on knitting your sock until it measures anything up to 5cm [2in] more than the length of your foot. That’s right, you can knit right on past where your heel is ultimately going to go because next week, we’re going to do a Very Brave Thing to knit our heels. Stay tuned for that!
And while you’re measuring, why not also try your sock on your foot and make sure you’re happy with the fit. That is, after all, one of the joys of toe-up socks. You can try them on as you go!
So that’s the general plan for the next fortnight… knit one or both of your sock feet and let yourself go a bit further than the length of your foot. But before we wrap up to today, I just want to chat managing ends for scrappy socks and also throw out some ideas you could consider if you want to mix up what you’re doing for the feet of your socks.
Managing Your Ends
If you are working on a sock made from scraps, you will perhaps be working stripes. Here are my scrappy socks which I’m knitting up in remnants of Coop Knits Socks Yeah! 4ply and a Zauberball Crazy.
I am working eight rounds in each stripe. I’m not carrying my yarns up the inside as I think that will be uncomfortable. Instead I’m knitting in my ends as I go.
Here’s how I do it: I stop about 6–8 sts before the end of the round on the final stripe in a colour. I then knit in the end of my new colour over those last few stitches. Then I knit the first 6–8 sts of the new round in the new colour while knitting in the end of the old colour. In this way I won’t have endless ends to weave in at the end of the project. Here’s a video to show you how: Knitting in your ends (YouTube link)
If you’ve not tried knitting in your ends before, a scrappy sock is a great way to give it a go! But if you choose not to knit in your ends and instead leave them loose to weave in, why not do your future self a favour and weave them in every few stripes? You’ll be glad you did when you reach the sock’s end!
Foot Variations
I’ve been really enjoying working on my two pairs of socks for this KAL … I love how plain stocking stitch shows off the vibrant stripes of Fab Funky Fibres yarn, and the 8 round stripes of my scrappy socks let me get into a bit of a rhythm before I need to change colours. But there is, of course, a whole wide world of stitch patterns, stripe sequences and colour play to explore. Here are a few ideas for your feet, if you need some inspiration.
Helical stripes (YouTube video tutorial). One row helical stripes can make really fun socks with no jog! Since the stripes are so narrow, this works best if you’re knitting with two colours with a decent amount of contrast. Separate your scraps into a pile of darks and lights, and get striping. Striping a solid with a gradient can also be a really cool way to break up the long colour changes of something like a Zauberball or Zauberball Crazy.
Colourblock or Fade. If you’re knitting scrappy socks, there’s no reason to restrict yourself to stripes! Why not try colour blocking (change up the placement or some of the colours of on the second sock for a fraternal pair) for something a bit different? Or, if you’ve got a selection of scraps in a similar colour family, put together your own fade or gradient by arranging them from dark to light. Start at one end of the spectrum and knit a block then, when you’re ready to shift colours, alternate rounds between your old colour and the new shade for a faded look!
Introduce a stitch pattern. And of course, there’s no reason you have to stick with stocking stitch (knitting every round). A rib, is of course, a classic choice for socks, but the sky is the limit; socks are nice small canvases for trying out new ideas and techniques! Work your chosen stitch pattern across the top of the foot (half of the stitches), but do make sure to try on and check the fit as you go, especially if you didn’t swatch in the pattern.
And that’s it for this week! We’ll be back in two weeks to talk about inserting the heel. In the meantime, we’d love to see how you’re getting on over in our Use Every Scrap KAL topic on The Knitalong Hub or on Instagram, where you can share your progress using the hashtag #UseEveryScrapKAL. Happy sock knitting!