Birthday Sox!

Whew, Alice! I finished just before my drop dead date! Sunday morning at 4:30 I was wont for sleep, and I knew if I got up and knitted for a bit that before long I would have to go back to bed. I did it! Finished up sock no. 2, so that they were ready for washing and blocking on Easter Sunday (Julie will be pleased that they have the Lord's Prayer knitted into many, many of the stitches).

These started more than a year ago when Julie sent to me a couple of black fleeces from the shearing floor where they helped with shearing in Nebraska. I went through the bags and...well, much of it became compost. I sent her a lovely thank-you note and a sample of the Shetland I had been spinning...it, too, was filled with vegetable matter, but, darn! a much nicer fleece...one worth spinning! Not long after, a package showed up again at the doorstep and lo! this is what it held (photographed after washing)!
This beautiful fleece came from friends of hers, Cory's Lincoln Longwools in Montana, and honestly, it was so beautiful, glossy, and loopy, that it made me think it was an angora fleece (mohair)! The finally-(and yes, finely) spun yarn acts in much the same way as mohair. There is no stretch, it has a halo, and the strong, long fiber length will definitely hold up well as sox. After much rumination, I decided that sox were one of the best uses for it. That, or a nice pair of outer mittens, a hat that has a soft yarn lining band at the forehead, or woven into a scrumptious coat fabric. There is MORE! I used only approx. 300 yards on sz. US#2 needles.

The Fourniers' book, In Sheep's Clothing, a Handspinner's Guide to Wool says about Lincoln wool: "Commercial uses are upholstery and wig making. Its luster and relatively soft handle for a strong wool make it very desirable for blending with mohair to create a yarn with less than 100 percent mohair but with the same or similar characteristics."

The pattern is Vining Lace from the Socks-Socks-Socks book from XRX Books. A lace knitter I am not. This yarn begged to be lace, however, in that I had spun it so fine I would have had to create a pair of sox on sz.#0 needles, and I knew they wouldn't be completed until 2009 were that the case. Ah, lace! says I.

I am happy to be moving on to the happy, colorful sox planned for my dear cousin! Usually by the time I finish knitting a pair of socks that have a lacey pattern, I am finally familiar enough that I think I could do another pair. That is not happening for some time now. ;)



Stewart popped them in the post for me yesterday. Now we shall see if they arrive in South Dakota by the 28th day of March!


Hope you are hanging in there!
Your Chick