a tale of two socks.

around this time last year, i was talking to a friend and together we were trying to figure out a problem she had come up against while sock knitting. she wanted to keep her pretty yarn for the instep and upper portion of the sock, and use a plain, contrast colour for the sole as well as the heel and toe.
after a bit of brainstorming, we came up with a solution!

fast forward a year, and i've knitted myself a pair too to test our theory.



these are my two-toned vanilla socks. quite the success i think.

i used this vanilla sock pattern as my basis (as i have for almost every pair of socks so far this year... it's a great pattern!) and went from there!



the basic premise i used was to begin the socks, knit the toes in the round as per the pattern, and then when it came to knitting the body of the foot of the sock, i split my stitches into sole and instep stitches. i knit the sole first using the same yarn as the toe, backwards and forwards, slipping the first stitch of every row. i continued knitting backwards and forwards, completing the gusset increases and then the heel, before moving back to the instep stitches.
using my fancy yarn and the instep stitches i had on hold from the toe, i began working backwards and forwards again, to create the instep but instead of slipping the first stitch of each row, this time i picked up the slipped stitch from the sole in the corresponding row, and knitted (or purled) it together with the first stitch of my instep row, using an ssk decrease or a p2tog.
once i'd knitted the full instep and had picked up all of the stitches along the sides of the sole and heel, i went back to working in the round, continuing to work with my fancy yarn.
i decided to do a contrast ribbing section too



they were a little slow going for me, though i think that was all to do with my mind!
i think i was a bit scared of them not working, and having to pull them out.
i had a stern talking to myself though, it's only knitting, not brain surgery! it's ok to make mistakes when they're so easy to fix! and look how well they've turned out?!

they're aaaaaalmost perfect... unfortunately, they're a wee bit big on my feet. damn!
not to worry though, i'm sure there's someone out there with bigger feet than me he he.

what do you think? would you give these a go?