Randall's Socks Take 2 (Also known as the forever socks)

9On my continued Quest to make socks that work perfectly for the Mister, I have made socks that never fit to begin with, and socks that slid down over his heel, and now, finally, socks that fit!  Sortove.

Orange being his favorite color, I jumped on the KnitPicks Stroll Brights snapdragon to get him some neon socks..and then started to wonder how to make them fit.

I started by realizing that the main problem is that the Mister's heels are about 2 sizes bigger than his feet, and that his ankles are about a size smaller.

I chose a base pattern from ravelry, Little Minx, which was a gorgeous and simple pattern, but every fourth row had every stitch cabled once, and it was slow-going.  In fact, it took me so long I almost gave up.  It also ended up coming back to bit me, since cables aren't very stretchy, as you'll see later.

About an inch and a half before the start of his heel, I started increasing one stitch on each side of the center stitch of the sole every other row.  Essentially, something like this:

Row 1: knit instep pattern, knit half the sole, m1r, k1, m1l, knit the rest
Row 2: knit instep pattern, knit sole
Row 3: knit instep pattern, knit half the sole, m1r, k3, m1l, knit the rest...

I continued on in that fashion, making two on either side of these growing insets, until there were 18 extra stitches, and then continued on to the heel, which I did in short-rows, the amount of which had basically doubled because of the inserts.

At the end of the heel, I decreased stitches in the same manner as the increases, only backwards, until I had decreased about 10 stitches.  I ended up with more stitches on the cuff than the original sole, and continued in the pattern all the way around until the bind off.

The result?  They fit perfectly.  Too perfectly, in fact.  They're almost impossible to get on and off!

Well, they're comfortable while he's wearing them, and that's a start.  Hopefully the next ones can be a bit stretchier while still fitting well!

Ravelry Project