Fiber Arts Friday: Casting on Small and Simple

A few weeks ago, I learned that I would be taking a work trip in the summer to the Desert Southwest.... and started thinking that I wanted a small and simple project to bring with me.

My Save Our Sheep Sweater is fairly bulky now and it has moments of not being simple.  So it is not a travel candidate.

My Scrappy Palindrome has been getting recent attention and is absolutely simple, but it is definitely not small.  So while this is a travel candidate (only because I will be driving and not flying), the size of it means it will be very warm to work on.... a nice feature in the winter, but not as nice in the summer... in the desert.  ;-)

I also have my Box o' Unfinished projects.  But none of this was really speaking to me.

So I started thinking that I should start a pair of simple socks.

Step 1 - Select Yarn

I had bought a pair of fun skeins I wanted to use for Hubba, but for the life of me, I am unable to find them... My yarn/fiber stash has always been reasonably organized.... but since the settling in at the new place is going slowly, most bets are off.

Toward the end of my packing, all kinds of un-related things ended up in boxes together... and clearly that particular box is yet to be un-packed. :-/

The good news is that I do have a small bin of Sock Yarns.  So I chose one that sparked my fancy.

Step 2 - Select Pattern

Since the yarn I chose has color variation, I want the pattern to be as simple as possible.

I am not a fan of color changes and patterning in the same piece.  It seems that a lot of people like this.  However in my experience, few do it well... and I am not one of those people.

While I have a large queue of sock patterns I want to try, I settled on the very simple, Sock it to Me pattern, which I've made a couple of times for Hubba.

Step 3 - Swatch

Since socks need to fit closely, understanding the gauge is essential.

The yarn label recommends US3.  Which is a good place to start... but US2 or US1 may be needed to get the right fabric for socks.

So I went to my inventory of tools.... which was not super successful.  I found a few US2s but only one US3, and nothing else in the range I was looking for.  Which meant I had to dive into the Box o' Unfinished Projects and make some decisions...

Pretty incredible how the idea of starting a simple, small project launches so many other activities. lol.

The resulting decision was to use US1 needles.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!