Moving Along

Here is the sock so far. The foot is done and the increases for the arch have been completed. The sole sts are on the bottom needle and the arch/instep sts are divided on the two top ones.




If I were working a "traditional" sock-with-heel-flap from the toe up, I would have placed those increases at each side of the instep, forming a traditional looking gusset. But the point of Bordhi's book is that they can really be placed anywhere. So in this pattern they fall immediately to one side of a narrow band of diagonal sts travelling across the top of the foot.

You can see it a little better from the front, though the same yarn characteristics that made rows hard to count also make the "definition" of this feature less than stellar. You can also see that I had a little difficulty maintaining tension with this stretchy/springy yarn.

One thing I don't understand yet is the rate of increase. When I'm working top down, I decrease in the gusset section two sts every other round. So working toe up I would expect to increase two stitches every other round (or an average of 1 st per round). But Bordhi's formula is two sts every three rounds, and then some extras in the last round immediately before beginning the heel action. I'm assuming she has a very good reason for doing it this way, and that somehow it makes for a better fit. I just haven't wrapped my mind around what that reason is. Any ideas?