Chasing Snakes by Mercè Janer

Chasing Snakes

Knitting
June 2011
Fingering (14 wpi) ?
30 stitches and 42 rows = 4 inches
US 1½ - 2.5 mm
328 - 437 yards (300 - 400 m)
small, medium, large
English Spanish
This pattern is available for free.

Para ver el patrón en castellano sigue este link:
http://esmixuquefeiacalca.blogspot.com/2012/03/calcetins-...

These were originally knitted with handspun yarn, but any commercial sock yarn should work. Sometimes I knit just for the sake of knitting, just swatches. I was doing that, putting some cables here and there and making them twist just to play, without any pattern. When I stopped and looked at it, I instantly loved it so I decided to use a refined version of the first design in something that would actually have some use. That’s how these socks were born.

I love to look at yarns that are very variegated. They are very nice on the skein, but to knit with I usually prefer semi solids -- yarns that have different shades of the same color.

With the creation of such a yarn in mind, I space dyed my roving with different greens see green sock below, shades that were close to each other but not quite the same, then I spun it very finely to get a 3 ply fingering yarn. I wanted to make a Navajo plied yarn because it’s the technique that better respects the sequence of colors of the roving, and I loved my roving. When it was done, it felt like the perfect yarn for this project. It has some subtle variegation that cheers up the stockinette parts, but is not enough to overshadow the cable pattern.