Over the weekend, I finished my winter travel project socks. These are the ones I started back in January. I did gauge swatches for them on my first flight of ski season, from Detroit to Salt Lake City. I decided on the Slip Up Socks because only one row in every four really required close attention so it seemed best suited to working on in distracting environments like airports and planes and such. I only realized later that it wouldn’t always be easy to pick it back up and know when that one row was next; I eventually resorted to using a row counter to keep track, but decided not to rip back and fix the instance where I did that one special row one round too early. Mistakes add character, right? Another character-adding feature to these socks is the slightly wonky toe increases; I needed an extra stitch on one side to get up to the multiple of six I needed for the pattern, which one might think wouldn’t be that big a difference but it seems to have made the toes just a bit looser than I’d like. Ah well, there will be other socks and other chances to get the fit just right.

These might be the most widely traveled of any of my knitting projects so far. In January, these socks were in Utah, Idaho, and Montana. In February, they went to Washington and a different part of Idaho. Then in March, they made a road trip through Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, a bit of Wyoming on the other side from where they’d been in January, and Colorado. I pondered saving them to just work on during trips so they’d pick up a few more states, but given that I’m staying close to home for a few months here, I decided I should go ahead and finish them while I still remembered how to work the pattern. I like how the finished product looks, but when I choose next year’s travel sock project I’m going to have to remember how easy it was to accidently drop one or more of the stitches in the slip step of the pattern and how not fun it was to pick them back up with an eensy weensey crochet hook in not always ideal conditions for seeing what I was doing.

As I mentioned above, the toes on these are a little wonky, but I’m pleased with the heels. I’m getting much better at not leaving gaps at the end of the short rows, and this time I tried working plain for several rows after the heel before starting the pattern on the leg. I don’t remember where I read that tip first, and my bookmarks aren’t talking; I think it really does make the heel look better, more in proportion or something. Now I get to decide what to knit next. More socks? Goodness knows there are plenty of patterns I want to try, and I’ve got plenty of sock yarn stashed. A sweater? If I started one now, I quite possibly could have it done in time to wear this winter, and I’ve been meaning to do something with all that Felted Tweed I’ve got. Both socks and a sweater? Something really small, like an iPod case? There are so many possibilities.