addendum: sock yarn

I forgot to include this additional use of sock yarn in yesterday's socks post. After seeing a friend's version of these, I impulsively decided that I needed a pair. I use fingerless gloves for knitting, because it is usually cold in the living room where I park myself to knit. The pair I had, machine made, was all stretched out. But then I had the unusual idea of washing them and they sprang back into shape, so I really don't need this unfinished pair. However, they are ribbed all over, so they do cling nicely.


The pattern is available free through Ravelry and is called Ruffle and Rib Fingerless Glove. It is a simple pattern made on #3 double pointed needles with about 200 yards of sock yarn. I added a pre-planned afterthought thumb at about 5 inches up from the ruffle, since there was only a thumb opening in the pattern.


The whole point of this is about the yarn. It is a new Knit Picks handpainted sock yarn called Imagination of 50% wool, 25% alpaca, and 25% nylon, soft and warm. All of the colorways look good on the Knit Picks site. This one is called Damsel.


Now in ranting mode I have posted before about Knit Picks variegated yarns and my dislike of their colors. Partly it's because I remain ambivalent about all variegated yarns, often disliking how they look knitted up (but not always). I compared the colors in this yarn to meat, but that was a euphemism for what I really thought it looked like: viscera. So part of the reason I used this yarn for gloves to wear around the house was because I wanted to use it up.


The outcome here is not that I have grown to like the color. I haven't. But I don't think it's as bad as I did at first. The lesson is that Knit Picks variegated/hand painted colors really are off base. By its name, I take it that this yarn is supposed to look feminine. To my eye it just looks darker that it should be and a tad muddy. The photo above actually shows it in its most flattering light. In reality, it looks more like this:

Not a EW, but definitely a MEH.