Sneak Peek

Finished the first diamond lace sock! Here's a sneak peek:



I wrote up the pattern, and am test knitting it with the second sock. I should have the pattern available for you in a few days. I think I even figured out how to chart it as well! Unfortunately because of the pattern, there is only one size. I cast on for the second sock:



This was the fourth time I did the picot cuff, and learned a lot from all of it. I'm sure many of
you know all of this, but here is what I learned anyways:

Picot Cuff Notes:

The first try was with a long-tail cast-on, k 7 rows, turn, k7 rows and knit sides together.I learned from this tutorial. There was a seam on the inside which I did not like, and the cuff flared out a little too much for my taste.

The second try was with a provisional cast-on, k2p2 rib for 7 rows, turn, k7 rows and knit needles together. This made the inside seamless, which was nice, but it was way too much work for me. Also, it didn't flare out as much, but the rib made the picot bumps all uneven. For those of you who actually enjoy working with 9 dpns at the same time, there is a great tutorial here for the cast on, and here for the cuff.

The third try turned out best. I used a single cast-on (aka backward loop cast-on), k2p2 rib for 6 rows, knit 1 row, turn, k7 rows, and knit sides together. Normally I would never use this cast-on, but it made only one loop to knit through (not 2 like in the long-tail), so the inside was just as seamless as the provisional. And since the cast-on was on the inside, it didn't matter that it wasn't so pretty. By knitting the row before the turn, the picot bumps weren't uneven any longer.

I tend to knit too tightly. For the turning row, and the knitting together row, I went up a needle size to 2.5mm, and it made things look more even.

Hopefully this will be of some help to somebody. Now I'm off to finish my socks!