Mi Contra Fa

Socks: Nearing the end

Behold!

On the left, the previously-completed sock, after its trip through the washer to shrink it down.  On the right, its mate in all its not-yet-shrunken glory.

For reference, here is the Coppergate sock from York:

I saw on Mistress Thora Sharptooth's nalbinding page that the rows of nalbinding on that sock are about 3.6 per centimeter.  That's slightly less than 3mm per row. Eyeballing an inch as the length of my thumbtip, I'm getting 1.5 rows/cm in the toe (where the stitches are larger) and 1.9 rows/cm in the heel, where I tightened things up.  Bigger stitches than the original, but also getting towards the limit of what I can do with my yarn.  I don't know, but I would guess the original sock is done using a finer yarn.

 

Incredible shrinking sock

So, on the advice of the Internet, first I soaked the sock in a sinkful of hot water.  Not very long, maybe two minutes.  It didn't seem to shrink at all.

Continuing on the advice of the Internet, I put it into the washer.  Soak cycle - should be pretty safe, right?

Well....

It sort of actually fits now.  Tight across the ball-of-the-foot area, and the heel barely come up from the bottom of the sock at all - it's almost more like a slipper.  (The camera's out of charge - I'll update with a picture later.)  And it felted like crazy.  I'm wearing it while it dries, to hopefully keep it from shrinking any more.

I'm not sure what I want to do with the other one.  I have a few options on the table, including 'forget about nalbinding socks.'  It's not like I go to events where wool socks are a critical piece of equipment, and there's the risk of hurting my wrists again.