My Sock Lover's Socks are coming out quite well. It's my only project on the needles at the moment, so I've been able to devote all of my knitting time to them. But they hit a snag about a week ago. Of course all my socks seem to have complications, so I'm not sure why I was surprised. I guess I was feeling pretty confident about having knit so many stranded socks in the past months. Surely I had made all the mistakes I could.
The saga began while knitting the sock on the left. As with all stranded color work socks, I thought it was a good idea to try it on as I went to make sure it fit right. It fit great (hurrah!), but then I noticed that the colored stripes nearly disappeared. Now, you would think that after knitting two different pairs of stranded socks I would have gotten a handle on yarn dominance. (A note on yarn dominance: I knit using two hands when I do stranded color work. In the typical knitter, the left hand holds the dominant strand.)
Before the reckoning
You can see on the left, the grey is the dominant color, while on the right, the colored stripes are dominate. Well, wouldn't you know it, if a pattern is regular, like vertical stripes, the color in my left hand is the dominant one. But, if a pattern is somewhat irregular, like an image of a sock shape, the yarn held in my right hand is the dominant one. Apparently, I'm a very special brand of knitter.
Before I ripped out the first sock, I started knitting the second one with the grey held in my left hand and the color in my right. It seemed to fix it, which is good. I'm much happier with how the pattern is appearing on the socks now. Super bonus: some of the rounds on the first sock had been a little tight for my taste. Having the yarn dominance be off made it easier to rip.
7 comments :
Isn't it amazing how, no matter how long you've been knitting, you can always learn something new? I have a similar issue with Kitchener stitch. I'm not sure why, but I have to work the stitches in a different order to get it to lie flat. I couldn't tell you why, but sometimes knitting is just mysterious.
I'm so glad you figured this out before actually getting that point on these socks, though!
I can't believe the difference between the two! Good decision to rip back though, it looks a lot better! I tend to have both strands in my right hand when doing colourwork, but the problem with that is that I always catch myself switching between dominance (not a good idea).
They are going to be amazing. In terms of yarn dominance, here is a tip: the yarn carried under is the dominant yarn. It's the way I think of it. The two strands naturally sit one above each other. As long as the dominant yarn is carried under, it always works. Not sure if that helps or not!
Your pictures confirm that yarn dominance is a serious thing to consider when it comes to stranded knitting. I don't feel brave enough to knit a pair of stranded socks myself, though I'm always drooling in front of my computer when I see yours :)
Those are the best socks ever. I'm glad you noticed the colour difference now before turning the heel!
I haven't done much colorwork... These look fantastic!
You are always full of great tips. Sorry to hear that we are all benefiting from your misfortunes. Despite that...these socks are gorgeous!
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