Birkenwasser knits

In this episode, I talk about the Tour-de-Sock competition focusing on stages 3 (Bicycle Race by Heidi Nick), 5 (Flibbertigibbet by Lisa K. Ross) and 6 (Sidetracked Socks by Kirsten Hall). You can see me wearing my There Will Be Time short-row cardigan and I will also talk about some future plans with lovely Primrose Yarn co yarns and a work-in-progress with Isager Spinni and Alpaca 1 yarns.

Tour-de-Sock: http://tour-de-sock.com
Plan A: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/plan-a
Odensjön Socks: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/odensjon-socks
Bicycle Race: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/bicycle-race-2
Arctic Blizzard: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/arctic-blizzard
Flibbertigibbet: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/flibbertigibbet
Sidetracked Socks: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/sidetracked-socks
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2vElEzz (As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases)
Primrose Yarn co: https://primroseyarnco.com/collections/sophia-mcn
There Will Be Time cardigan: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/there-will-be-time

In this episode you can join our knitting circle on our journey to Turku to visit ILO Knitting Shop.



In this episode I'm working on

Flibbertigibbet socks by Lisa K. Ross: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/flibbertigibbet

Sidetracked socks by Kirsten Hall: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/sidetracked-socks



I'm wearing my favourite sweater: Alignment https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/alignment

In this episode I talk about my Arctic Blizzard sock pattern for Tour-de-Sock Stage 4: how the sock is constructed, how you can modify the pattern and tips for stranded knitting. Also why I was happy to get more snow in Helsinki in April.


Arctic Blizzard: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/arctic-blizzard
Tour-de-Sock: http://tour-de-sock.com
Bicycle Race by Heidi Nick: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/bicycle-race-2
I'm wearing my Alignment sweater.

In this episode, I talk about the Tour-de-Sock competition and show the first two pairs of socks. I also talk about Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and what that book has to do with Tour-de-Sock.



Tour-de-Sock: http://tour-de-sock.com
Plan A: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/plan-a
Odensjön Socks: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/odensjon-socks
Bicycle Race: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/bicycle-race-2
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2vElEzz (As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases)
Kaiku test knitting: https://www.ravelry.com/discuss/birkenwasser-knits/3814892/
Steller Tunic: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/steller-tunic

In this episode I talk about my latest pattern release, Astrum socks: what made me design socks and how the toe-up pattern is constructed. I also talk about the crochet rug project for my balcony.

Astrum socks
Odensjön Socks by Suzanne Sjögren
Crochet rug in Koukutettu blog

The last round of Tour-de-Sock was a tough one. We knew beforehand that it would be four colors and quite a large amount of yarn. It turned out to be stranded knitting using four colors, which is still ok. The new thing here was jacquard floats, and these two combined made knitting slow. Very slow. Actually, most of the participants didn't even get started with these socks, and those who did dropped out pretty soon after noticing how much time it would take to finish this pair.




Jacquard floats was a new technique for me. It means that you add float stitches every two or three stitches apart and purl these stitches with yarns in front. This way the inside of the sock is also almost knitted, and there are no long floats to worry about. It does make the socks rather thick, though. You need to pay attention to the order of your yarns. I only noticed this as I was knitting my second sock: you can see how the float stitches are showing at the top of the large squares. At that point I was wondering how I managed to knit the first sock without learning the technique, but also at that point I didn't care anymore; all I wanted was to get these socks off the needles. In retrospect, I could have easily fixed those visible float stitches with a crochet hook at that point, but now I just have to accept them.


Another problem with these socks was the heel. Turning the heel meant working the square pattern in the middle and decreasing the gusset stitches on the sides. As the contrast color is not involved in the decreases, it meant that I got large holes next to the decreases no matter how hard I tried pulling the main color working yarn. For the second sock I tried wrapping the contrast color around the next float stitch on the sides, and that helped a bit, but I still took a needle and yarn to close the gap afterwards.


Here's my set of TdS socks. I got one pair that's too small for adults, and one with too many mistakes to give for anyone, but I also got 4 pairs that I can give as gifts when needed and learned many new techniques. All in all a good experience, that is! But I'll never knit socks again...

The 5th round of Tour-de-Sock included plenty of cables with some beads. There were practically no repeats on the pattern, so you had to look at the chart on every single row. Not something you can carry around and knit a round here and another there...

Mosaic knitting is something that was expected and feared on Tour-de-Sock. When stage 4 pattern was released, there was a collective sigh of relief: it's a lovely pattern! This pattern makes great use of mosaic knitting: you couldn't really achieve the same result with stranded knitting.




This time the pattern was released at 6 AM, so I thought that if I'm ever going to get socks done in one go, this would be the timing for that. I can't stay up late and I can't knit if I'm tired, so any round that begins in the afternoon or evening (or night) means that I will eventually give up and go to bed. This time, I persisted until midnight and got the socks done! For the last hour, I was so tired that I would have normally given up and gone to bed, but as I was already knitting the toes I decided to stay up and finish the socks.


Unfortunately, blocking didn't even out my slipped stitches like I was hoping for. I'm still happy with these socks: I think the neon pink looks good and the smallest 60 stitch size turned into a women's medium size with my loose knitting.

Third stage in Tour-de-Sock included lace and cables and many options. Picot cuff or ribbing, decorative heel or Eye of Partridge, and even more options if you are not competing: ribbed or patterned instep. First choice is yarn, of course, and for me there were only two options: wildly variegated dark green or this pink with gray and white tones. The reason for only two options was that we were visiting my sister and I only packed these two. The pattern was published at midnight on Friday, but I decided to go to bed early and then to wake up early to get started before everyone else gets up.





Weekend at my sister's was great, and I did get some knitting time here and there: in a park, on the bus, at a museum (I did check the exhibitions with Young Warrior, but when he wanted to inspect the exhibits at the Game museum more thoroughly I took the opportunity to sit down and knit). Now, this pattern isn't exactly optimal for on-the-go knitting: it looks easy enough to memorize by taking one look at it, but it isn't. That meant a lot of time wasted correcting mistakes. More time was wasted with the extra work on the heels and I only finished the socks on Sunday evening after returning home. That meant finishing 72nd.

Linking up to CreaDienstag.

For the second stage of Tour-de-Sock, I was prepared to be competitive: it was my last vacation day so I could just sit at home and knit. But then it turns out that the start is at 8 PM and that kind of ruined my plans, because I can't stay up all night and knit. I surprised myself by staying up until 2 AM, though, and the last bit I owe to Hippusia Johanna who was doing a live Instagram of her knitting and that kind of kept me in the knitting mood for so late. By the way, reminded me of when I was young and there were TV chats with hosts - the host reads SMS text messages that are also shown on the TV screen and then comments on them. Seemed to work in the knitting competition context! (Sorry for not participating in the discussion, but I was knitting so I couldn't type messages at the same time :)



The second pattern included colorwork, and it gave me an opportunity to try out my new yarn thimble. I forgot to show it on my recent post of Jyväskylä Summer Knit Festival, but it was actually my first purchase. I'm glad that the first booth that I visited at the festival was Goldsmith Sanni Lehtinen's, because she only had like 5 yarn thimbles left at that point and I was lucky to still get one. I have to say that it made knitting so much easier as I didn't have to worry about keeping the yarns in order.


The pattern also included Latvian braids, and that was a new technique for me. This is what I love about Tour-de-Sock: it forces you to try new techniques! I had seen Latvian braids before, but I'm not a big fan of the look, so I probably would have never tried them if I didn't have to.

I had some trouble with my choice of yarns. My first choice didn't match the pattern, so I had to think of something else after seeing what I would be knitting. I loved the Priha socks, also by Tiina Kuu, that I knitted on the warm-up round and the dark blue looked so good that I wanted to use it for these socks as well. I had 40 grams left, exactly the same amount as in the sample small-size socks listed on the pattern. Only thing is, that in the sample the main colour was not used in colorwork, which was mentioned, but I didn't notice it at that time. So, I ran out of yarn at toes, and had to use the contrast color, which doesn't look very nice.


Having already started knitting, I started thinking that my contrast colors might not have enough contrast after all, so I made one more change before starting the colorwork. This is where I lost my sponsor yarn point, as I switched from a Lanitium ex Machina yarn to the pink that I used here. To be eligible for extra point for using sponsor yarn, you'd have to use sponsor yarn in either the main color or both contrast colors. If I were to knit the socks again, I would use the dark color for the birds, and a lighter color as the main color.

Being in the competitive mode, I went with the smallest size. I thought it was a women's S, but the model in the pictures is my 6-year-old! She loves the socks, so we have a happy owner for this pair. Only thing she's not happy with is the tightness of the legs, she really had to pull hard to get them on. I was afraid of ripping the socks when I forced them on my extra legs to get the first pictures for the competition.


And the competition? Well, I finished 24th, so I did a lot better than the first round! For the next round, I'll be traveling again, so no competition there. I'm still hoping that there's going be one round that I can knit in one go. If I can knit socks that fast. I'd like to try.

It's Tour-de-Sock time again! Last summer I swore that I would never do it again, but by May I was just checking the schedule and yarn requirements, matching my stash with the sock schedule and not going to participate at all, and before I knew what I was doing, I had signed up for the competition.


The first round started on Saturday, July 15 at 2 PM. This was in the middle of a family vacation tour through the Baltic states and we were supposed to drive from Daugavpils in Latvia to Vilnius in Lithuania that day. I knew that I couldn't sit at the hotel and knit until the socks were finished, but I wanted to use the driving time for knitting. Luckily, the world's best playground is located in Daugavpils, so the rest of the family agreed to spend the morning in the park and head to Vilnius after lunch. I was able to read through the pattern before we left, and luckily it wasn't too complicated so knitting in the car was ok. I skipped the part of learning what Turkish cast on is, and used a more familiar one due to the circumstances. In Vilnius, I was able to knit a couple of hours more before going to bed.


Luckily, the pattern was easy to memorise, and I carried the socks with me, taking advantage of any playground stops or waiting times. Of course, I didn't get the socks done before leaving Vilnius, so there was more knitting time on the road, stopping in Trakai and Kaunas before arriving in Klaipeda. I managed to knit the easy parts during the day, and then for the unusual heel construction (afterthought leg - as in afterthought heel, except that here you knit the heel first and then pick up stitches for leg) and the fins on top of the cuffs I did in the evening at the hotel. The last fins I knitted on top of the Parnidis dune on the Curonian Spit, which, by the way, is one of the most amazing places I've seen. We stopped at a cafe to take pictures of the socks, and I tried to e-mail the pics and post them to TdS forum to claim my points. In the end, four days after the beginning of stage 1, I was 139th to finish. It didn't go that well, but I have to say that I'm happier for the day in Vilnius than I would have been for staying at the hotel and finishing earlier. Also, with the new point system it means that I still got 17 points. Let's see if that's going to be any good in the overall standing.

The last stage of Tour-de-Sock was totally random. Or the cables in the socks were random, that is. Starting from the toes, the socks have seven cables and the way they move is determined by a dice and by flipping a coin - or some other method of creating randomness. After the heel, another set of seven cables are added to the back of the legs. Three random numbers determine which cables are going to move at each repeat, and a coin is tossed to determine whether the cables move left or right.



For this round, I was thinking that the start would be while I'm on a train returning from a family holiday trip to St. Petersburg or the same evening once we're back home. I was contemplating about whether to pack yarn or not, as it might be that I wouldn't need the yarn during the trip. The idea of having the pattern published in the afternoon and NOT knitting it on the train felt like too big of a risk, so I packed my souvenir from Stockholm, a handpainted skein of neon pink sock yarn. The reasoning behind the choice of yarn was that it was the only full skein of sock yarn in my stash.


Later it turned out that the pattern would be released at 8 AM. I was slightly disappointed by the news, as I had been hoping to have one round that would start in the morning and I could try to knit until I was finished, but obviously I wasn't going to spend a day in St Petersburg sitting at a hotel and knitting. I did wake up at 7 AM, take a shower and pack my things before the rest of the family woke up, so I could download the pattern and get started before leaving the apartment. For the rest of the day I managed to get in a stitch here and there, and then I had the full 3,5 hours on the train dedicated to knitting.


Oh, and the random numbers. As I was knitting the socks on a family summer holiday trip, I wanted to involve the rest of the family in the process. Therefore, I used my kids as random number generators, as it also provided an opportunity for them to learn a new concept. It also taught that random numbers cannot be generated by "randomly" giving them, as the "give a number between 1 and 7" would almost always give the same three numbers (and the younger random number generator would typically first say "8"). There was also an argument after getting numbers 4, 5, and 6. I told that it wouldn't look nice if the numbers are consecutive, but the rest of the crew argued that you can't change the result of the random number generator according to what you want to get, so I did three cable turns next to each other in the same direction. (After this round, I omitted the random numbers on some repeats in order to get cables that also look nice.)


As this round didn't turn competitive after all, I took my time and finished 40th. That makes my overall standing 41st, which is ok if you think of the 1221 registered racers (and not ok if you think of Liina finishing 17th... - congrats for reaching your goal, Liina!). A relaxed team turned out to be a good choice, and Traveling stitchers was the perfect team for me. During the tour I was knitting on an airplane, on a long-distance bus, and on trains; travelling with the socks in Trondheim, Norway, Jyväskylä, Konnevesi and Tampere in Finland, and St. Petersburg, Russia.


I can't believe the amount of time that I've spent knitting socks this summer. I managed to get two pairs that fit me, so I should have enough socks for the rest of my life. The socks that I was using before this were a gift from my sister some 20 years ago. My feelings after the tour: I'm glad that I participated - I learned many new things and tried techniques that I wouldn't have tried otherwise. I also spent way too much time knitting socks, and I'll never knit another pair after this!

Today is RUMS day!