Once upon a sock in March 18 – sooo many ankle socks

I have been knitting my little socks off this month (DID YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE, KIDS) – once the Borage socks were done it has all been about getting those two pairs of ankle socks knitted up as samples in time for Travelknitter to take to Edinburgh later this month.

And… I am done! Thank god. It was lovely working with Larissa’s ultra-gorgeous yarn (I highly recommend it), and the pattern kept my interest for, ooh, at least the first two and a half socks (or three and a half, if you count the test one I knit first). By the time I was on the last one though I was definitely running out of steam, so it was a relief to sew in that final end and get them blocking away. But the good thing is that they’re all ankle socks so overall they knitted up nice and fast.

HOWEVER, I can’t show you all of them yet because the second pair is in that brand-new colourway which is still under wraps. Here’s a preview of the finished red and charcoal ones though (I’m still in love with that red) – and watch this space for a proper FO post as soon as I’m allowed to make all the pictures public.

The question is now: what socks to knit next? The logical thing is to return to my Twisted Soul socks. For various reasons I’m not sure I can face them right now though, and also there is something percolating in the back of my mind around a fair-isle sock – one in shades of grey but maybe with a pop of colour just beneath the cuff. Hmm. I need to spend some time thinking about what happens next, sock-wise.

Excitingly, this month we have two three four new knitters joining our monthly sockalong posts (and another joining us next month!). So you have MANY other excellent knitting blogs to have a look at for all things sock-knitting-related today. Links below – and I’ll update them to go to specific blog posts once everyone else’s is live.

• Kathy B at Compassionknit (new!)
• Steph at My Making Do Adventure (also new! her post is live)
• Liz at Knitty Little Sew and Sew (our third newbie! and her post is live)
• Reanna at Knit, Reanna, Knit! (our fourth newcomer, wow! her post is live)
• Stefanie at Stefanie Crafts with Wool Paper Fabric (not new, but she has an ace new site! her post is live)
• Katherine at Fiber and Sustenance (not new but she has a fancy new domain! her post is now live)
• Paula at Spin a Yarn (not new but always excellent! and her post is live)

In other news, it has been a very exciting week since I last posted. After listing my Freedom and cables hat pattern on Ravelry last week, I couldn’t help watching to see how many people were liking and queuing the pattern (such a buzz!). And on Saturday afternoon, emboldened by having already listed one pattern, I thought back to other things I’ve made in the past and remembered my Ombre textured cowl. It is one of the easiest things in the world that I’ve ever knitted, but I wear it a lot and the ombre colours work so well over those textured stitches that I thought other people might like it too. So up it went (you can see ‘all’ both of my pattern listings together here, look!).

Then on Sunday I was doing a bit of admin on the blog, and noticed that the visitor stats for little old felinity knits were up a surprising amount. There’d been a spike thanks to the hat pattern, but suddenly they were going unusually, vertiginously high (like, several times higher than any busy day I’d ever had before in the whole lifetime of this blog). I had a look at Ravelry, and saw that the ombre cowl was getting a lot of likes and queues (and a couple of cast-ons – woohoo!). So then I looked at the pattern homepage on the site and Oh. My. God. I’d hit the ‘hot right now’ top 20! At one point I was in 12th place!

I can’t tell you how much fun Sunday afternoon was (Gareth was dutifully excited for me too, though I don’t think I was able to quite convey exactly a) what Ravelry is, and b) what a big deal it was). Things have calmed down now and my stats are approaching normal levels again, but it was all very exciting for a day or two there.

12th place baby! Woooooohooo!

I have to admit that the whole process has sparked all manner of creative design thoughts in my head, too. Watch this space!