Heel We Go

The options for June for the Sock Knitting Group were
Technique: Design Your Own Or Vintage Patterns
Designer: Stephanie Van Der Linden

I decided against designing my own pattern as I knew there would be too many choices to make so for June I opted to make a Stephanie Van Der Linden pattern. I chose Grün ist die Hoffnung as it started with knitting lace in the round and then continued into a sock. I used Fleece Artist Merino in a softly variegated green.

You work the lace medallion first, continue on one side to create a short row toe, work the sole in stocking stitch while picking up stitches on two sides of the square, continue in the round on all stitches until foot is long enough, work a short row heel, continue in the round until leg is the required length. And there’s your sock.

The written pattern by Stephanie Van Der Linden was very short and easy to follow except I was not sure what she meant for her short row instructions, so for the first toe I worked a standard wrap and turn that I have used many times for heels. Except when completed I was not sure I really liked the look of it, as I had 3 more opportunities of working short rows in this pattern I decided to try other methods to compare and which I liked best for future reference.

Here is the picture of the first wrap and turn toe.



For the heel, I searched for instructions on how to do the double stitch method referred to in the pattern. This is a photo of just one side. I found plenty of instructions for working this on the purl row but not for working on a knit row. So I am not convinced that I worked it correctly on knit rows.



The second toe, I worked without wraps and picking up a stitch at the side when working back along the rows. This is a picture of the nicer side. With this method I had to really make sure I had picked up the correct stitch.



I had found two clips on You Tube for short row heels that involved knitting two together and making a stitch on the return rows. As I had just one heel left, I chose to go with this method.
This is a picture of what it looked like.



The end result of my experimentation (apart from a pair of socks) is that I decided that my original wrap and turn toe did not look as bad as I first thought; the final method is the one I like best but I will need to make some modifications to ensure both sides of the heel look the same; there are more methods out there for me to try.

Here are the finished socks.