Sock knitting starts to fly

Progress is made! I struggled through the gusset decreases on sock-the-first for Son2. When I finally redid that enough times to be okay with it, the foot went great, and the toe went smoothly too. Wheee!

Right away I cast on for the second sock, and just two days later I have the cuff nearly done. My ribbing on this cuff is much smoother and more regular than the first one! Just four more rounds and it'll be time for the heel flap. I don't think you can actually tell that I did an alternating slip stitch on that first heel. I thought that might be what the mysterious eye of partridge heel was, and I like the look much better; it's more subtle in a nice way.



Just for fun I'm also using a row counter that I got for free in a bag of "estate" knitting needles I bought from a friend for a buck per pair of straights or circular. These needles, though, are some bamboo double-pointed needles (size 2.75mm, I think) that I got 'cause this acrylic Bernat Hot Sox was sliding all over my aluminum dpns.

I love rapid progress!

Since my knitting needles seem to be flying all of a sudden, I feel more confident about learning to do yarnovers and getting comfortable with the pattern for the socks I'm knitting for myself. Here's a picture of how they've looked for a few weeks, with the caston and two edging rows knitted!



They'll be a lacy-columns simplification of the New England Sock from Knitting on the Road, in an ivory machine-washable cotton-wool-nylon sock yarn. The aluminum double-pointed needles (size US1, I think) seem nice with this cotton-wool-nylon yarn.