The socks have it

When I opened my sock drawer this morning, it was hard not to be seduced by all the beautiful colours there and dither about which pair to pick for today. I do have one or two current favourites which appear in the wash on a pretty regular basis, but there are also other pairs that may stay hidden at the back of the sock drawer undiscovered, only to be greeted by my feet as long lost friends at a later date. When it comes to choosing which socks to wear, I'm not generally guided by colour - it's unusual for my socks to match the rest of my clothes! Often, a recently finished pair becomes the new favourite, as is the case for my Squeezebox socks.

And at other times, it's an old friend that cocoons my toes, keeping them nice and snug...

Sometimes, when I need a hug, a rummage in Mr JK's sock drawer is just right. Mr JK was a late convert to hand-knitted socks, but absolutely loved them once he'd worn his first pair. Luckily our feet are the same size so I can wear his too. 

This pair of Mr JK's have been worn a lot over the holidays - I bought the yarn in Dublin as a souvenir of Mr JK's first marathon and designed a pattern, Kali Kardi, which you can download free from Ravelry here. 

There is nothing quite like a pair of hand-knit socks - they are warm and comfortable. Apart from the socks I wear to the gym, I never wear shop-bought socks now. They are ideal projects to work on as they are portable, if it's a plain sock, the pattern is easy to memorise and once you've finished knitting and sewn in the ends, there's no more finishing off to do. Sock knitting is definitely addictive. There is so much temptation to just knit another round so that you can see the next colour or pattern emerging and before you know it, you're almost at the heel flap! It's little surprise then that I currently have three pairs on the go - well one pair down and two pairs to go to be more accurate. These were all meant to be finished and given as gifts at Christmas but as ever, my focus has been rubbish. But I am cracking on with them and am determined to get them finished in the next couple of weeks.

There is so much lovely sock yarn around these days, we are quite spoilt for choice. For everyday socks and for socks that I am gifting, I tend to choose yarns such as Regia, Opal, Stylecraft Head over Heels and West Yorkshire Spinners as these are all good washable yarns. Sometimes, a treat from an Indie Dyer is just what the sock doctor ordered. I like the self striping yarns from Easy Knits and also the stripy yarns from Fab Funky Fibres. In fact, any stripy sock yarn floats my boat right now. How about you? Do you have a favourite go-to sock yarn? xxx