Salvaging Trystero

The saga of the Trystero socks is finally over!

(Actually, it was over in December, I've only just decent pics of them now, so I hadn't blogged about it)

After casting on the first time, I got thoroughly confused and had to rip :( The second time, I decided to use Socktoberfest as a motivation to get these socks knit, because it's such a lovely pattern, and I didn't want it to just disappear into the ether of projects that will never be knit. So I cast on, knit down past the heel, halfway down the foot, and it was too small :( I hadn't accounted for how the cables would pull in, and no, I hadn't done a gauge swatch ;)

Not to be outsmarted, I re-cast on quickly, going up to 2.75mm needles (I'd been using 2.25mm the first and second times. I knit down to the toes this time. I tried it on when I was just past the gusset, and it seemed OK, so I just kept going. However, it wasn't OK. This time,it was too big!! The sock was too wide, and looked like it was going to stretch a little more with wear.

I gave up. The nearly completed sock, and the yarn (purple pure wool 4 ply by Rennie, off of ebay) went into the corner. And there it sat till December, mocking me. Every time I looked into the corner of UFOs, my mood dropped, because I was so annoyed with these socks. I swear, it was laughing at me!

Eventually, I got fed up being annoyed with it. I picked it up, to see if there was anything that could be done. Maybe I could rip back to the heel, and use a smaller needle from there on. Or something. Anything to get the damn socks done!

I put it on over my hand to look at the stitch pattern, and pulled it up so that the foot was over my hand, and the cuff was over my forearm. And then it came to me. Fingerless mittens! I could rip back to before the heel, and just continue from there, with no heel turn, knit a few stitches later in waste yarn to attach a thumb to, knit a few rows of ribbing at the top, and hey, presto, a fab pair of mittens!

So I did just that:




Basically, I repeated chart A until I was where I wanted the thumb to go, knit a few stitches in waste yarn, then did another repeat. I decreased stitches at the hand ribbing, to make it a big snugger. Basically, I just decreased wherever there was a p3, to make it a p2, so that the ribbing from there was k2, p2. Then I bound off, and picked up the stitches for the thumb and knit a few rows in ribbing, until the thumb was as long as I wanted.

I made the mittens elbow length, which I love. They're super warm under my jacket, which is good because I wear vests and t-shirts normally, so extra long mittens means I don't have to put on another layer under my jacket. They're quite gothy too in the purple. ;)



I really like the Trystero pattern as gloves (pattern here, by the way). It's made me look at sock patterns in a whole new way now too. I've been browsing ravelry ogling sock patterns and imagining them transformed into gloves and mittens.

Hopefully one day I'll be able to actually knit the Trystero pattern as a pair of socks! I don't think I'll try it for a while though, I'm all Trystero'd out at the moment! :D

Trystero Is Kicking My Bottom!

A while ago, I tried to start Trystero by Cookie A. I love the pattern, but back then it seemed too hard. I don't know what I was doing wrong, but I just couldn't even start the cabled portion properly. I got the ribbing done, then got stuck. I put them down and left them, meaning to get back to them.

And I didn't. Until Socktoberfest came along! I've never participated in Socktoberfest before, but this year it suddenly struck me that this would be the perfect motivation to restart these socks. I'm determined to finally finish them!

SO. I started knitting them, on size 2.25mm needles, same as I always use. This time, I didn't get stuck at all. The pattern just suddenly seemed to make sense. It's fairly straightforward - I don't know why I got stuck at all the first time. It's just a case of knitting the rib then moving round a few stitches and following the chart. I'm magic-looping this time, maybe that makes a difference, or maybe my brain is just switched on this time round! :) So I was getting really into knitting them, and got down to the heel flap. Then I decided to try them on.

Can you guess what's coming? :)

Yup, too tight.

Dammit!

I had to rip all of this:



Right back to the beginning. I've restarted on 2.75mm needles. I had to restart immediately, or I know I'd just put the pattern aside till next socktoberfest! I've done a couple of repeats now, and they seem a lot more stretchy, but I haven't tried them on yet. I'm hoping so much that I don't have to start them on 3mm needles! That just seems ridiculous to me somehow.

The pattern is really quite ingenious. It's straightforward but looks much more complicated because you move the stitches around to begin knitting the round in a different place. The technique's really quite amazing, simple yet so effective! (Maybe that's why I got stuck first time around, I just couldn't wrap my head round it.)

I'm very glad I decided to do these for socktoberfest, I don't think I'd have the heart to keep restarting otherwise! They're like the socks that don't want to be knit! I think they'll look really good when they're finished, if they ever get finished, that is!