journey of a sock

I took along James' honeymoon socks as my trip knitting. I had plans to do his socks AND some christmas socks but I grossly underestimated how long it takes to knit socks. Since I was knitting James' socks the entire trip they had some wonderful adventures. Besides doing most of the things we did there were some special highlights for the sock.

It got to sit on a termite mound (to give a sense of scale).


It did such a good job at this that its hard to find--look on the left just above and to the side of the little arch.

Some sock knitting got sadly interrupted because of the bad condition of the roads, so it just got to gaze out the window for a little while:


Maybe the roads don't look so bad to you but imagine a really really bumpy roller coaster and it was sort of like that.

By the time the first sock was finished it was famous. Women (who were trying to sell us things off of platters balanced on their heads while we were stopped in traffic) stared in through the windows and had extensive conversations about what I was doing and how I was doing it. It got to meet a crocheted purse made by the Nigerian women sitting in front of us at a Durbar (ceremony thing where chiefs and important people meet).

It was officially finished at lunch after we me met the chief of the Gunja (he was not introduced to the sock, some things don't translate well). James was appropriately pleased....


My mother thought perhaps it felt like expressing its inner thoughts as a hand puppet.....


And Emmaunel (our driver who thought it was really hilarious that I spent all my time knitting socks) thought perhaps it might make a good necktie...............


The second sock felt a little jealous as it had little of the glory of the first sock. It was all business and work work work with that one. But the night after we returned from Ghana it was finished and James officially has honeymoon socks (two years too late)

one of these things is not like the other.....

Sock Number Two

You may be thinking to yourself, that sock looks different, so solid, so... You are right. When I got to the toe I had more than enough yarn to finish, which left me with a dillemma. Do I....

A) Knit the second sock like the first sock, with a different colored toe? Even though I don't like it as much as a solid sock?
Advantages--Save time, be done faster, get on with the day, knit something different, cozy feet now.
Disadvantages--First socks that I will look at forever and say, "they could have been better."

B) Finish this sock with the regular yarn and make it more beautiful. Have to rip out the toe on the other sock and reknit.
Advantages--Beautiful socks forever that I love.
Disadvantages--Ripping out the toe is a little scary and involves cutting into knitting, time, time, time.

Being a bit of a perfectionist, guess what I chose?


The carnage. Uneventful quick carnage, however, so that half an hour later I had.....


Pretty honeymoon socks (a bit belated)! I really love these socks. They are very grown up. Very deserving of being honeymoon socks since you have to be old to have a honeymoon (well you don't but maybe should be).

And as an extra bonus.....


Now I can knit the bird some socks. Or the classroom guinea pigs. Or....I really have no idea what to do with this leftover yarn. I'm absolutely shocked how much I have left. And irritated because there isn't enough to really make anything else, but I am incapable of throwing it away. One day I will find a use. Maybe it loves Ipods and wants to keep them scratch free.

Now that I am done with socks I am officially Leaving The House. Something I haven't done for two days because I have been waiting for the stupid passports to come. Now the lovely State Department tells us that, though we should have had them on Wednesday, they are still being processed in New Hampshire. Oh and why don't we make an appointment at the local passport center to speed things up a bit? Luckily, I already did this two weeks ago because it is a two week wait to get an appointment.

Why on earth would you tell everyone they need a damn passport to fly out of the country and then be surprised when there is a record increase in passport applications?

(Gris-Gris says, "how ya doing?")

sock it to me

When I was little I was very afraid of monsters. They could be lurking anywhere, the backyard, the basement, the top of the monkey bars, the bottom of the slide, or the closet.














Thanks to my father I had a lovely homemade loft bed so I KNEW there were none under the bed. Well, maybe there were some under the bed while it was being constructed in the basement. Those basement monsters were forces to be reckoned with. My father must have performed an exorcism when he brought it upstairs.

When I got a little older we had a cedar closet which instead of monsters, housed vampires. This was particularly disturbing because it was right next to my bedroom. Sometimes I would run quickly out into the hall and down the stairs so that the vampires would not notice me.

For the past few days I've been feeling this way about one of my current closets. Inside lurks a grownup monster.......Unfinished Knitting. Not just any Unfinished Knitting, the Unfinished Sock.

Two years ago James and I got married and took our honeymoon in France. I got a little obsessed with the idea of knitting socks on the trip because they don't take up a lot of room and I had never knitted socks before. Even better, I was going to knit us both purple socks, matching honeymoon socks. My friend Paige and I went to the yarn store to buy all the materials I woudl need. She generously financed one set of socks as a wedding present. I was off. I made it most of the way down the leg on the plane trip over and had grand hopes. Then I got distracted by France. And driving since James doesn't drive stick (and to be fair, hadn't lived in France and done plenty of driving there before). On the way home I did a little more, turned the heel and began the gusset.

As soon as I got home it went into the closet. And it stayed there. It even moved closets last summer. Some of the yarn became a hat. I took out the needles to use on another project.

As I read more about knitting I read more about knitters who are obsessed with socks. As I see more pictures of hand knit socks I find they look more and more enticing. The Yarn Harlot who loves socks, knits socks, writes (hilariously) about socks. and takes socks sightseeing is pulling me down the rabbit hole with her blog.

As my upcoming trip to Africa looms and I again need something portable that will take a while I have begun to think about knitting socks again. And about how maybe I should knit James' honeymoon socks. And, if I am going to do that, maybe I should try to finish MY honeymoon socks. So I have been tiptoeing past the closet, wondering how much of a mess my socks are, wondering if I can possibly figure out where I am in the pattern.

Yesterday evening I cracked open the closet to have a look. Here is what I found:



OK, what I found after I put the needles back in. A sock! One that had no dropped stitches! One that I could figure out where I left off! But one that might not have enough yarn to finish. I decided to try. One Park Slope Food Co-op General Meeting (You have to work to shop, you can get credit for going to meetings twice a year, I can knit through meetings. A perfect solution), some TV watching, and a call to the State Department to check on passports later...


...a sock and a half! The toe is a different color so I don't run out of yarn. I have plans to make it look more intentional. Maybe if both socks look the same it will look more intentional. But it is still a sock! My first sock! I think I might love knitting socks. Almost as much as dishclothes.



In other exciting news Gris-Gris now says, "OK, Gris-Gris, see you later, goodbye! heh, heh, heh, heh!" In fact "see you later" seems to be her favorite word of the day. She just started saying it last night. At a phrase a week what is her vocabulary going to be like when she's 25? I think we are in big trouble.