Osterspaziergang Socks

After some stressful months, I needed something hopeful ... That's why I decided to knit a pair of socks in fresh colors. Socks that look like spring is in the air. With a yarn in pastel colors and discreet and easy-to-knit lace pattern. The socks are knitted top-down with an afterthought heel.

This work by Knitting and so on is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.



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The name "Osterspaziergang" (Easter walk) comes from a famous part of Faust (Part I). It starts like this:

Vom Eise befreit sind Strom und Bäche

Durch des Frühlings holden, belebenden Blick;

Im Tale grünet Hoffnungsglück;

... 

An english translation can be found here (scene II, rows 903ff.).


Materials

• about 50 grams of fingering weight yarn (or more, depending on your foot size)
• 2.5 mm dpns
• scrap yarn (for the afterthought heel)
• a tapestry needle to weave in ends

Gauge
12 sts to 4 cm, 16 rows to 4 cm

Special Techniques and Other Useful Information

• Afterthought heel: A great overview how to do an afterthought heel can be found here at dummies.com. Knit Purl Hunter has a series of three YouTube videos where the steps to knit an afterthought heel are shown.
  - placing the scrap yarn
  - removing the scrap yarn
  - knitting the heel.
• Kitchener Stitch: i.e. grafting two life rows of stitches as for example shown in this YouTube video by Purl Soho.
• Sock Knitting Table: There are already a number of tables available on the web that tells you how many stitches to cast on for socks of any foot size, e.g. here by Schachenmayr (see table on page 3), here by Regia or here at aboutneedlework. For this pattern you need the number of stitches to cast on for your socks. 
• Loose Cast-On: If I knit top-down socks (or something else that needs a loose CO), I always do a longtail CO, but on two needles.

Instructions

Use a stitch number that is a multiple of 4 (e.g. 56, 60 or 64).

Loosely CO the number of stitches advised by the sock knitting table and join in round.
I CO 60 stitches and  distributed the stitches on 3 needles.

Cuff
Knit 12 rows of ribbing: * k2 p2 repeat from * to end of round

Knit 6 repeats of the following pattern
Round 1: k all
Round 2: * k2tog yo k2 repeat from * to end of round
Round 3: k all
Round 4: k all
Round 5: * yo ssk k2 repeat from * to end of round
Round 6: k all
You can do more repeats if you want a longer cuff.

Foot
Knit half the stitches on your needles (for me these were 30 stitches) with scrap yarn, place marker, and slip these 30 stitches back to beginning of row.

Then knit repeats of the following 6 rows until the foot is as long a the desired total foot length minus 10 cm (toe and heel).

Round 1: k all
Round 2: k to marker; k2, * k2tog yo k2 repeat from * to end of round
Round 3: k all
Round 4: k all
Round 5: k to marker; k2, * yo ssk k2 repeat from * to end of round
Round 6: k all

Toe
My usual formula for toes is:

• once: 1 decrease row, 3 normal rows (k all stitches)
• twice: 1 decrease row, 2 normal rows
• three times: 1 decrease row, 1 normal row
• and then decrease rows only ... until there are only 24 sts in total, then graft in stockinette

This means
Round 1: k all
Round 2 (decrease row): * k1, ssk, to 3 bef marker, k2tog, k1 repeat from * to end of round
Round 3: k all
Round 4: k all
Round 5: k all
Round 6 = Row 2
Round 7: k all
Round 8: k all
Round 9 = Row 2
Round 10: k all
Round 11: k all
Round 12 = Row 2
Round 13: k all
Round 14 = Row 2
Round 15: k all
Round 16 = Row 2
Round 17: k all
Round 18 = Row 2

Repeat round 18 until there are only 24 sts on your needles

Graft in stockinette stitch.

Heel
Pick up the stitches of the rows directly below and above the scrap yarn. Then remove the scrap yarn.
In the first round pick up 2 or 3 stitches from the gap, i.e. between the upper and lower row.

Then I knitted the heel with the following formula

• alternate 1 decrease row with 1 normal row (k all stitches)
• ... until there are only 24 sts in total, then graft in stockinette

Or spelled out

Round 1: k all
Round 2 (decrease row): * k1, ssk, to 3 bef marker, k2tog, k1 repeat from * to end of round
Repeat rounds 1 to 2 until there are only 24 stitches left on your needles. Graft in stockinette stitch.

Weave in ends. Make two.