I volunteered to knit a pair of socks, selected blue yarn, and immediately started to re-think my color choice. Was the blue perhaps too smurfy? Then I saw it in person. Ladies and Gentlemen, it is exactly the color that Cookie Monster must be in real life. I am in LOVE. It’s got this depth to the color that makes me imagine Cookie is in my kitchen baking and talking to Siri right now. I adore it. I think I may be crossing into ‘Space Cadet doesn’t dye a color I don’t love’ territory.

I sat cross-legged on my back patio and snapped a few pictures to capture the joy I’ve felt as I knit these socks. In addition to the color, the stitch definition on these socks is great and they’re going to hold up well, I can feel it.








Yarn: Space Cadet Oriana 8-ply
Colorway: Look up!
Needles: 2.25mm Addi Sock Rockets for the legs
2.25mm Nova DPN’s for the feet
Pattern: Test knit for Hunter Hammersen

Tags: handknit, handknit socks, hunter hammersen, knit, knit socks, knitting, knitting and crochet blog week, sock, sock yarn, socks, Space Cadet yarn, yarn

I recently found myself in Dallas with nary a care in the world. So, I did the only logical thing and hunted up a yarn shop.


A year ago, I purchased knitting classes for my nieces from Holley’s yarn shop over the phone. The nieces gave the shop rave reviews, so when it showed up on Google, I hopped in my car. I wandered around Susan’s store (Holley is her maiden name) for over an hour, chatting with her. I found the shop to be tidy, reasonably priced and to contain a great selection of knitting gifts like mugs, yarn bowls and Knit Kits.


She also carries a nice selection of Twisted Owl yarn, Knitted Wit yarn, and Done Roving Yarns. I could have used a little more indie dyed sock yarn, but that is nearly always the case for me.































This bright cotton display had visions of dishcloths dancing in my head and I got a tiny bit of Christmas shopping checked off my list.







If you’re still not sure you want to make the drive to try out a new yarn shop, allow me to tip you over the edge. It’s two doors down from Liberty Burgers. I ordered a Baby Bella (mushrooms, queso, a fried onion ring, basil garlic aioli), a torch (bacon and queso filled fried jalapeño served with ranch), and a strawberry shake. The food was so good that I stopped Instagramming and focused on savoring every. single. bite.


Now, this may sound like a lot to consume in one sitting, so if I’m being one hundred percent honest, I spent an hour on a treadmill afterwards to burn off a few calories so I wouldn’t feel completely ill. It was worth it.

Tags: Done Roving Yarns, Holley's Yarn Shop, Knitted Wit Yarn, knitting, Liberty Burgers, Local yarn shop, LYS, sock yarn, Twisted Owl Yarn, yarn

My friend, Bonnie, recommended the Leyburn socks for variegated yarn. She’s knit these twice and been perfectly happy with them. As I’m typing this, I went to look at her projects and have just this minute realized that she knit both pairs top down rather than toe up as the pattern calls for. I bet she even mentioned that to me at some point…

Anywho, I knit a toe up Leyburn and it was gorgeous! but far too tight across the top of my foot. I took a deep breath and ripped out the entire sock. I located the Crystalline pattern which had the added benefit of a nice little cable up each side. and waited a year.

I then knit a Crystalline sock and it too was tight in the same elfing spot. I tossed that aside and started a third sock and made sure the heel flap was going to be tall enough to feel comfortable….by actually reading the pattern which called for a 34 row heel flap instead of the 30 row heel flap I’d done. I knit a 36 row heel flap just for good measure and was pleased with the fit. Back to sock 2. Made that flap 36 rows and finished the pair. All’s well that ends well. Except, the thing about variegated yarn is that it’s variegated. What I ended up with is a sock that I LOVE and her slightly less attractive step sister. Ladies and gentlemen, there is a reason I knit so many semi-solid socks.

Pattern: Crystalline Socks by Cailyn Meyer
Mods: Crossed cables on rows 1 and 5 so I didn’t have to track an 8 row pattern and a 12 row chart.
All left crosses on one sock and all right crosses on the other.
I had 20 sts remaining after the heel turn on both socks, so I did one extra decrease after knitting across the heel the last time.
Toe Decreases: (Repeat round 1 & 2) 6 times and then decrease every row.


Needles: 2.5mm Signature Needle Arts for the Legs
2.25mm Signature Needle Arts for the Heels-Toes

Yarn: MadelineTosh Tosh Sock

Colorway: Spectrum

Tags: handknit, handknit socks, knit, knit socks, knitting, Madeline Tosh, sock, sock knitting, sock yarn, socks