We love seeing projects made with yarns from our shop, and we truly feel honored that so many of you bring your finished pieces in for show and tell. When I’m able, I like to take pictures of these completed projects to share here on the blog. I’m always collecting them, and sometimes they seem to sort themselves into themed posts – all one kind of wool or technique, one yarn in particular, or even a shared color palette. Today’s theme is socks, a favorite project of ours, and the knitters featured here have made some amazing pairs.

Glen knit the vibrant pair above with MJ Opulent Fingering, a hand-dyed blend of merino, cashmere, and nylon. The pattern is “Dublin Bay Socks,” a free download from Ravelry, and it looks excellent in this semi-solid colorway, showing off the lace detail down the leg.

Lois’s socks have a lot in common with Glen’s: the pattern, “Socks on a Plane,” is available for free, they have a little pattern running down the leg and foot on a stockinette background – in this case, a cable, and they were made with hand-dyed yarn, the beloved Malabrigo Sock. I often warn knitters that cables and other patterns don’t show well in highly variegated yarn, but this is exactly the kind of exception that proves the rule. I love the way the wild colorway shines in simple stockinette, and the cable doesn’t disappear into it. Rather, it pops out a bit, brings welcome textural interest to an already interesting color. Well done, Lois!

Above are Karin’s “Sidney” socks, from Rachel Coopey’s CoopKnits Socks Vol. 2, made with Malabrigo Sock. These are the latest in a long series of increasingly intricate handknit socks that Karin has crafted for herself and her family. Like many of us, she likes to challenge herself a bit with each new project, trying a new stitch pattern or technique, and a sock is a good-sized project for that kind of experimentation. It’s a good way to learn a lot in a relatively short time, and Karin is living proof!

Margaretta is another generous, challenge-seeking sock knitter, and this “Harlequin” pair from New Directions in Sock Knitting pretty much blew my mind when I saw them in progress – organizing the bobbins alone looked like quite a task. She rose to the occasion, though, mastering intarsia-in-the-round along the way, and surprised me again when she came back for more yarn to knit a second pair.

This pair, like the first, is made with Malabrigo Sock, which you can tell is a popular sock yarn here at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop. Margaretta insists that her technique improved measurably from the first pair to the second, and while I believe her, I honestly think both pairs look equally flawless. Still and all, she gave the second pair as a gift to a friend, knit yet a third pair and gave them to another friend, and kept the “learner” pair for herself.

Thanks to the knitters who shared their work on this post, and to the many more who begin their projects with trips to our shop! We appreciate your support, and love seeing what you make. If you’re not a sock-knitter but would like to become one, check out Amy’s upcoming class on the subject, an introduction to basic socks that may send you on a sock-making spree. Look out for more show-and-tell on the blog in the near future!