Putting the sock blockers to good use

Yesterday we had daylight but no finished sock, today there is a finished sock (finished last night) but no daylight.

Yesterday the sock looked a little like this

And you can see the flow of the pattern on the foot here.

My socks have never seemed to lack blocking - it's usually provided by my feet so I've not regreted not having sock blockers before but they are great for showing off socks without having to do a convoluted handstand to take a picture of my own feet (and I can't touch my toes, I'm too lanky). So here is the first sock.

The yarn quantities are very generous so the cuff on my sock is at least 8", and that's with a good bit left over and long feet. It's a very easily memorised pattern, part of the Socktopus sock club and great for the commute.

It's a toe up sock and rather then going for an afterthought toe or a magic figure of eight cast on it starts in a rather ingenious way (you know me, I'm all for new ways to do things).

In this cast on you start with a little crochet chain in waste yarn:

Then you pick up stitches from the crochet chain

And knit a little square patch

Unravel the provisional cast on and put the stitches back on another needle

And then pick up down one side, work across the bottom and pick up along the other side and you end up with a little nose warmer for a bunny or an embrio sock depending on how advanced your SSS is!
It looks a little bit clunky in this picture but by the time the sock is finished it's all evened out - clever or what!?