Letters, I Get Letters

I love getting mail. Time to answer a few questions.

jeskatkel writes:

What pattern did you use for the socks? They do look funny, but I like them!!!

I don't think of myself as a "knitting designer", but I guess I am. I made them up out of my head, starting at the toe. I made a turned, short-row toe, just like a turned heel. Picked up the starting row, knitted up the foot, turned the heel, and knitted the ribbed cuffs (twice to get them to fit to my satisfaction).

And I confess, the first socks I ever knit on my homemade sock frame, I didn't have a pattern for. I started at the cuff, stopped and made about sixty-eleven swatches until I figured out how to turn a heel on the frame, turned the heel, knitted the foot, turned the toe, and kitchenered them shut.

Wow, doesn't that sound easy -- I learned to graft by doing it every possible wrong way first. I think I learn everything that way. Having a catalog of mistakes-already-made does make it easier for me to help beginners!

Lobie asks about the dishcloth:

The dishcloth you worked up is beautiful! And how clever of you to graph it, too. Might I ask if this is for re-distribution or sale? It's not your typical cloth and I would dearly love to work something as unique as this up myself.

I blush! I can't take credit for the dishcloth -- it was at the National Guard armory where my husband drills. I first noticed it at the armory Christmas party, and spent a while in the kitchen admiring it, despite the tomato stains and the onion smell. My husband brought it home a couple of months later.

I took it to the last West Michigan Lace Group meeting, and my friend tatt3r said, "I think I would have like to have known her." (The knitter who made it.) I think so, too. She must have been an interesting person. And all I know of her is this dishcloth!

Knit and purl patterns are surprisingly beautiful, aren't they?

The graph I can take credit for. Since I have no idea who knitted it, or where they might have gotten the pattern, I'll have to see what I can do about making a reproducible graph. How to make it up, where to put it.

But fair warning: the weather is slowly getting nice here in SW outer nowhere, and that means I'll be spending more and more time outside getting my hands dirty and my fingers rough. More time outside means less time inside at the computer!