Fourth time's a charm . . . ?

I am still struggling with the current socks on the needles. I tried a plain stockinette sock first, but I wasn't really digging the stockinette for some reason. Then I tried the Monkey pattern, which knit up prettily but provided no stretch. On my third attempt, I tried the Hedera pattern, with hopes that the lace would knit up nice and stretchy. I have no documentation of this attempt because I only did a few rounds of the lace pattern before ripping out yet again; I found the pattern to be too fiddly for my tastes, and my backward yarnovers (i.e., purl stitch, yarnover, knit stitch) were not showing up properly, which made the lace lopsided.

My fourth try is the Elfine pattern from Amelia at My Fashionable Life. Although I'm still somewhat dissatisfied, I've given up on finding a good pattern for myself and have decided to persevere with the pattern and give the socks to someone else. Clearly, I was not meant to make socks for myself out of this yarn.


(Please excuse the bad pictures. I was in a rush before leaving for school today.)

The pattern is knitting up nicely with this yarn (yay! no pooling!), but the circumference is a little wider for my foot than I'd prefer. Nevertheless, I decided that I was tired of frogging this skein of Koigu and have kept going, with the intent of finishing the pair and sending them off to live with a friend. I will never get through the stash if I keep knitting the same ball of yarn over and over again!

One thing I have appreciated about the pattern, though, is that it has given me a chance to try Gleek's modified short-row heel. Gleek noticed that handknit socks often use the same number of stitches for the short-row heel as for the instep, but store-bought socks work their heels over more stitches than the instep. So she suggests increasing a few stitches for the heel just a few rows before you actually work the short-row heel. I've only just finished the heel, so I don't know how the entire sock will look just yet, but it seems to fit all right:


Here's how the stitch pattern sort of looks (bad picture, I know):


The sock is a bit loose because the intended recipient has bigger feet than I do. And the flash was way too bright in the picture. But at least you can see the diamonds of the pattern a little bit.

The sock has been put on hold for the past few days, though, because I'm busy trying to knit up another graduation hat. The Odessas have been given away, and I think they were a nice surprise, so now I'm trying to work up a good sturdy ribbed hat for a male friend, who I don't think would appreciate beads. Once that hat's taken care of, I'll hopefully be able to power through these Elfines.

Posting will be sparse over the next week and a half, though, due to finals. But I hope you have a great weekend!