Finished A UFO

These are socks I started in March, 2017. One UFO off my list and ready to wear!

The pattern is Smooth Operator Socks. This was the first time I’ve done an afterthought heel. I’m not sure how I feel about it. It looks funny/different from a heel flap heel but it fits my heel perfectly. It’s so great for when you have a striped yarn and don’t want to mess up the stripe sequence with the heel. I love being able to knit a sock straight through without having to do the heel but that also means I have to be disciplined enough to go back and add that heel.

These socks were started before I began making two at a time so one sock was finished right off the bat. The second sock, when I picked it up two days ago, had only part of the ribbing done so I’ve done a lot of knitting. The trip to Abilene with Vince driving gave me some good knitting time. I didn’t take any notes on where in the stripe sequence I started the heel so, of course, the second heel isn’t a perfect match to the first heel. I think for striped socks, next time I’ll use a solid yarn and not have to worry about matching up the stripes in the heel.

Another good thing is that if the heel wears out, it’s easy to change with an afterthought heel but I can’t think of a single pair of my hand knitted socks where the heel has worn out. I’m pretty careful with them. I’ve some get really shaggy from lots of wearing and washing; I’ve had one pair that Rita gnawed on and ruined and I had a pair that Speck chewed into. Other those, I’ve not lost any of my knitted socks due “wear”.

Here’s another pair that needs the heel added. On the top sock,  you can see the grayish thread running through the red stripe about midway down. On the bottom pair, it’s a pink thread in the red yarn and I totally almost didn’t see that. In fact, right before I went to bed last night, I picked these socks up to look at them and grabbed the one with the pink thread. In the bad lighting and with tired eyes, I thought I had neglected to add the waste yarn so I fell asleep wondering how I would fix these socks. This morning, I thought to turn them inside out and I could see the waste yarn tails in there so I knew where it was.

The plan had been to add a black heel but I saw a skein of gray variegated yarn first so that’s what I’m using for these heels. If I get this pair finished today, that will be two UFOs off my list!