Ok, so I asked if we should talk about what changed between the first version of these (which were my very first pattern…fifteen years ago…when I did not know what I was doing) and the shiny new version that came out this week. And you said yes, so let’s do that!

So, the biggest thing is what I tend to think of as flow…how smoothly you transition between one section of the sock and the next. And this is a little nebulous and hand wave-y to talk about, but it’s pretty easy to see. There’s an instagram version of this where you can watch me wiggle it around and point at stuff if that’s more your jam.

Take a look at the spot where the yellow ones go from the ribbing at the cuff into the main stitch pattern,and then where the main stitch pattern switches over to the heel. Do you see how there are glaringly obvious transitions there? Pretty distinct breaks between one section and the next? Now compare that to the blue one. Do you see how the ribbing on the blue ones sort of seamlessly melts into the main stitch pattern? And then again on the heel how parts of the main stitch pattern continue all the way down through the heel?

That’s what I mean by flow. I want it to look like one part just sort of grew into the next, organically…seamlessly…smoothly.

Now I’ll be frank, that’s a lot more work to write. In this case it means every single size needs a totally different chart for the cuff and two totally different charts for the heel (in case you stop at the end of the main stitch pattern or half way through it), rather than just saying ‘work in knit 1 through the back loop, purl 1 ribbing for the cuff’ or ‘slip 1, purl 1 on wrong side rows, slip 1 knit across on right side rows’ for the heel.

But that’s ok! that’s the stuff I spent the last fifteen years learning how to do! And oh, oh when you get it right, everything just sort of sings. And I don’t know about you, but I totally think that’s worth the extra work.

There’s more…but this is also an ig thing, and I ran out of time to keep going over there (they don’t like us wordy types), so we’ll do that next time!