Twinknit

Pattern: Drunken Bees, from Domesticrafts

Yarn: Koigu KPPM, in what I call “Bombay Sapphire”

Needles: US 1 dpns

Thoughts/Modifictions: Man. This pattern rocks. It’s so squishy and crazy and complicated-looking. But really, it’s one of the most fun knits I’ve done in a while, even with four different attempts. This sock is for a friend — a friend with bigger feet than my own. This posed a unique challenge, as the pattern-as-written combined with my yarn-of-choice were creating a sock that comfortably fit my foot, but would have stretched badly on my friend’s foot. So I ripped. I tried knitting with larger needles, but this produced a fabric that was way too loose. Rip again. Then I decided to try knitting toe-up to alleviate my growing fear that I was going to run out of yarn. But again, it was going to take a great deal of fudging and rewriting and I didn’t want to mess with it. So finally, I started again, this time on smaller needles, but with an additional purl column added to every existing purl column. While this messed with the tightness of the buzzing pattern, I think it turned out pretty well.

My favorite part is the side-detailing on the foot. The pattern as written is pretty free, leaving the experienced knitter with a lot of choices. One of these choices was to continue the drunken “cable” on six stitches down the side of the honey-comb pattern. While you have to fudge the stitches a little to make it work, I totally think it was worth it.

I *love* the way it turned out, and I hope my pal does too, as she gets to knit the second one! Hurrah for an easy FO.