Crochet socks – a sort of challenge!

Last June when I posted about my latest knitted socks an interchange with Sharon of Creativity and Family about her desire to knit some socks and the fact that I had never crochetted any led to her saying “If you crochet some I’ll give knitting socks a go !! 😉 ”

We were relaxed about time scale and I fitted in crochetting a pair over the summer and Sharon knitted some in the Autumn.

Sharon wrote a blog about her socks here – https://creativityandfamily.wordpress.com/2015/10/27/yes-yes-yes-ive-done-it/ – Aren’t they lovely!

This is how I made mine.

I had a few balls of sock wool, some bought and some given to me that had been taken to a charity shop. I decided to chose this ball. No label but I think it might be Regia sock yarn.

I looked at patterns for crochet socks but in the end, in my normal impatient and self-opinionated way, I decided to work up my own, based on my normal toe-up method of making socks. (I kept notes so I can make the same again if I want to!) .

However I did learn a lot from here – http://quiltfixer.blogspot.co.uk/2009/03/step-by-step-crocheted-socks-crochet.html (I didn’t agree with the way she increased for the toe but I did copy the heel method fairly closely.)

I decided to do the toes and heel of the sock in simple dcs (US – scs) and started at the centre of the toe and I used a piece of red wool to keep track of where to make the increases. I decided that making the whole sock in dcs would be just too boring! so I decided to use trebles (US – dcs) and after a bit of experimenting decided to use this for the main body of the sock. I used plain trebles on the underside of the sock to keep the rows level and the bottom of the sock smoother.

For the heel I decreased until the width wanted, then increased joining in at the end of the row. This was the trickiest bit. And then for the final row I decided to make more of a scalloped edge by using three treble instead of two.So here they are worn by me! and

What do I think of Crochet socks compared to knitted?

• Making them with the trebles meant they worked up more quickly maybe even twice as fast.
• They are definitely thicker than knitted ones, that is really no surprise, so tighter in the shoes.
• The basic fabric is stiffer than knitted ones so they are slightly less comfortable but are less likely to slip down or wrinkle. (Again, no surprise really.)
• I really like the way they look and creating a patterned sock is much easier than knitting.

So will I make any more?

The jury is out on this one, as they say. Maybe one day, but the next pair of socks I make will be knitted.

I did start a pair in some wool I had that I had found impossible to knit with because it was such a dark colour and fluffy. I got this far, didn’t like the plain dcs (the difference between the blue and purple seems to show much less in real life (or my eyes)). I then tried a slight texture on the top but it didn’t gel with plains dcs on the bottom and so I have given up for now.