Listening to the Yarn

Because I have been faithful and diligent, and as a result the Cheerful Travelling Socks are all done except for grafting one toe and weaving in ends; I allowed myself to spend most of the day playing with some yarn and trying to ascertain which stitch patterns it liked best of the ones I had to offer.

I bought this from Sandy (of Sandy's Palette) at the Alpaca Festival in Madison a year ago. It's a wool/nylon sock weight and I love the colors.



The patterns are all variations of small cable moves (1 over 1 and 1 over 2). In either case, I slipped the stitch that would be travelling over the other(s) on the round or two prior to the cable round.

Why the slipping? Well I think it's interesting, just slightly different looking than a standard cable or twist. And it breaks up the color striping just a bit. And for me, anyway, it's a little easier to work when I'm going without a cable needle. When I drop a slipped stitch off to hang for the moment in mid air, it seems less prone to slither down into the row below than a regular stitch would be.

Why work without a cable needle? I hate picking the darn things up and then putting them down and then picking them up again all the time for small, closely spaced motifs like these.

I've about settled on which pattern combinations I want to use, and where I want to place them on the socks. But I'm not casting on yet. Right now I have a swatch. The minute I cast on for the real thing I'll officially have another UFO. I'll polish off the Cheerful Travellers before heading down that slippery slope.