Well, on Sunday evening (Sunday the 13th!) I finally cast on another pair of socks for DH.

The yarn is Lana Grossa "Meilenweit 6 fach" in a true solid dark green – his favorite color.  I like doing toe-up socks, so I don’t have to bother too much with a gauge swatch or any math or anything.  I figured I’d just increase until the toe was the right size, eh?

Also, since his astrological sign is Aquarius, I’d been toying with the idea of trying out the "Age of Aquarius" socks from Knitter’s Stash.  And of course, all you Aquarians will realize this means his birthday is coming up soon.  So, I voiced the possibility that these could be considered "birthday socks".

His response was, "Why can’t they just be Don’s-a-helluva-guy socks?"

I guess this means he wants more than "just" socks for his birthday present.  Given the scarcity of socks for him on the needles, though, I think he is on thin ice.  (It crossed my mind, after that smart-aleck remark, that I could just not knit them, and tell him they are now indeed "birthday socks", to go with his "birthday suit".)

Anyway, I used Judy Becker’s certainly-very-clever-but-not-really-magical cast on, and started working my way up the toe, using my favorite increase method of "make 1, YO", which I learned out of Priscilla Gibson-Roberts "Ethnic Socks & Stockings".

The Aquarius pattern is charted over 17 sts, so when I got up to 52 sts on my toe, I started the chart, doing a k2tog mid-round to get down to 51 sts.  Of course, you probably have already figured out what I, in the pursuit of a multiple of 17, had not:  51 sts on size 1 needles is not a big enough sock for DH.   I, too, realized it fairly soon – but I did a few repeats of the chart anyway, just to see how it looked – would it be worth futzing with the chart to get it to work with a proper-size sock?  No.  To be honest, it looked kind of boring.

I left it on DH’s dresser with a note (he gets up way early) saying I thought it was too small, but for him to try it and see what he thinks. Yup, definitely too small.  And he wasn’t wildly enthusiastic about the pattern, either ("It’s OK").

So, Monday evening I ripped that out (forgot to take a picture first, sorry) – and did some more increasing, this time comparing the toe width to a tracing of the "perfect" size Colinette sock.  I went up to 64 sts and did a couple of rounds.  Hmmm.  DH tried it on again and thought it was pretty good, but I knew better.  Just a smidge too big.

We also had a brief discussion about whether he prefers the instep to be patterned, or plain stockinette.  (Darn.  He prefers pattern.  There goes the "easy plain stockinette foot" idea.)  Finally, I had him look through a few potential st patterns to find something he might like, since the Aquarius pattern was out.  Then he went to bed while I ripped out a couple of rounds, and settled on 60 sts.

I started out on the foot with his first pattern choice, "Granite Rib" from my 365 Knitting Sts a Year calendar (April 20), but it kinda just looked like mush.  So, a bit more ripping back. His second choice was "Textured Ribbing" from the same source (May 5).  And it looks like we have a winner!  The only thing I don’t like about it was that I couldn’t properly center the 6-stitch multiple on the instep.  I consoled myself by figuring I’ll make the other sock a mirror image, at least.  DH will never notice unless I tell him.

I did ~20 rounds or so, and again left it on his dresser with a note asking for his opinion.  I got "It’s Good!  XO" scribbled back, so I guess we’re on our way to living happily ever after…

The End.