FO: Socks, 1 year in the making!

I can finally say that I have knit a pair of socks...

and I ain't too proud to show off my mistakes.

I'd actually started these socks a whole year ago. The yarn, Cascade Fixation, came in my first ever swap on the Knittyboard. BabblingStacey was my wonderful upstream, and when she learned that I was interested in knitting socks she sent me everything I needed to make some: lots of sock yarn, Knitpicks Memories plus the Fixation, some size 3 DPNs, and the pattern for Turtlegirl's Ankle Socks.

So I'd started them, but then school started up again, and I wanted to knit other things so the socks stayed in my basket for quite some time. I was determined to finish them, so I took up the project again in June. If you go back a few posts you'll see the mess I made of decreasing the first one, and if you look at the above picture closely you'll see that the second one is a tad shorter. Also, they're a bit loose, but I think they look kinda nice.

The main thing about my first sock experience is that it hasn't scared me off of knitting socks. In fact, I'm set to start my second pair next week as a Ravelympics event. I'll be using Silver's Sock Class pattern with yarn I got at a Bobmas Eve party.

Oh, and my Therapi for Hat Attack 2 came today! The yarn feels yummy, now I get to have fun swatching! Hopefully it won't take me too long to get gauge...

I should be doing homework...

...but if I don't knock out this blog post I won't ever get it out, and I have something really cute to show!

The pattern is Saartje's Booties, and I used up some Socks that Rock that was leftover from a Chevron Scarf I knit earlier this year. They're for my sister's neighbor, who is due next week. I made the larger size so I think it will be a while before they'll actually fit the baby.

I got one of my swap packages over the weekend, this one is from the Ravelry Book Club Swap.

I really liked the theme of this swap, you had to include a book and a book-related item. My swap partner got me a copy of Markus Zusak's The Book Thief, plus a really neat bookmark that I haven't tried out yet. She also got me some mint chocolates from Marshall Field's and a smashed penny from Chicago! I'm excited about that because I'll be going there for a conference next year.
So now I'm just waiting on my Knittyboard Summer Lovin' swap package, hopefully it'll come when I'm in the midst of my final projects so I'll have something to distract me...

First. Sock. Finished.

I can finally say that I've finished knitting a sock.
Whether I want to be proud of that statement is still the question.
It's done, but it's also horribly disfigured. Take a look:

My husband says it looks like it was made for someone with bound feet. If you look closely, you can see that the toe part is completely twisted, about 90 degrees from where it should lie. What happened is that I started decreasing for the toe with all my stitches distributed evenly on the needles. A lovely lady (Aunt Jean) over on the Knittyboard kindly informed me that I was supposed to have 1/2 of the total stitches on one needle for the instep, and the other half divided between the other 2 needles. I will surely remember that for next time! Meanwhile, it doesn't look that bad (to me) on my foot: