Big Calves

25 Responses to “Big Calves”

On January 28th, 2008 at 5:45 am adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

hi jean;

what is the measurement of your calf about 6 1/2″ above your ankle? where are you measuring your calf? the sock does not have a really long leg so you may not need to make any alterations.

the pattern is pretty stretchy so the medium size might work for you. otherwise, you can cast-on 72 sts for the ribbing. then you have two choices. you can continue working the 72 sts for the leg and then decrease away the “extra” st from the lace pattern (if you need help with this part, let me know) and continue with 66 sts for the foot. or you can decrease to 66 sts right after the ribbing and continue with the medium size instructions.

rereading your question: the first measurement of 6 1/2″ is the leg length not the circumference. the leg circumference measurements are listed next as: s-6 3/4″, m-8 1/4″, l-9″

does any of this help?

On January 28th, 2008 at 7:06 am Jean Halloda said:

Sorry I was obtuse - my calf circumference 6 1/2″ up is 12″–much larger than the large even. I think I am going to have to decrease away in pattern, as you suggest - a challenge, but a good one, just wondering if there’s a better way, or a particular place in the pattern to suggest.
Thanks
Jean

On January 28th, 2008 at 7:36 am Lisa said:

You are absolutely right-the trick will be to attractively lose the additional repeats. I often add a pattern rep. when I want my socks a bit longer. IMHO, it’s a matter of preference.

Here’s my fiddley thought: What would happen if you start to gently eliminate some of the YOs? The double K2togs and SSKs would take out 2 stitches for each repeat (where you eliminated the YOs). Perhaps decreasing every other repeat would work. It might also be too many too quickly.

Here’s a much easier suggestion: You might consider working the additional stitches in between the pattern repeats. In SS, you could work in the decs. in as you like/need.

I’d try casting on somewhere in the realm of 134 (which works for ribbing but not for the pattern).

On January 28th, 2008 at 9:05 am Tara said:

I hear you on that, honest I do. I haven’t got mine yet, but have peeked at the spoilers.

What I sometimes do with similar style patterns is knit them as fold overs. I’ll knit the pattern for about 1/2 - 2/3 the recommended length, then knit a ribbing based on pattern (like p4 k1, or p3 k3, or whatever works best with pattern) for almost the same length. The patterned design folds over the ribbing. NOTE: you are knitting the foot inside out at this point in time, as well as the ribbing.

If you do a heel flap type heel, you can knit the odd row into the flap, and be able to knit the foot as normal (which is what I do).

On January 28th, 2008 at 10:37 am Tan said:

I usually just decrease down the back, with a center stitch. Or, since I’m mostly a toe-up knitter, I’m increasing. By the time I get to the ankle I know my row gauge so I can tell when to start increasing. For my legs 2 stitches every inch usually works. Everyone’s mileage varies.

On January 28th, 2008 at 6:44 pm adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

how many sts do you normally cast on for your socks? and what is your ankle measurement?

i would hesitate to omit the yo’s as way of decreasing the stitches as these are an integral part of the “lacy” effect of the pattern; although you might be able to get away with it on row 25.

we will get this sock to work for you.

On January 29th, 2008 at 9:45 am Jean said:

I got out the tape measure & here’s what I found - most of the sox I make only go up my leg 4 1/2″ - if I knit on a size 1 is 64 stitches and size 2 needles 56 stitches. So, if indeed these sox are 6 1/2″ long, how many stitches should I cast on to fit around the 12″ calves and then have to decrease down before the heel?
Thanks again
Jean

On January 29th, 2008 at 10:25 am adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

it might be easier if you knit the sock shorter. it seems like you have a preference for shorter legs anyway? i would probably knit the medium, work the ribbing, then skip the first set of repeats, and just work rounds 1-26; continue with the pattern from there.

if you still want a longer leg, let me know and i will think on it. what gauge are you going to be knitting at?

On January 30th, 2008 at 1:05 pm Jean said:

You are just the sweetest! I have short sox mainly because when I learned to knit sox this was the number of cast on stitches & this is as far up my leg they will go! I shall just have to experiment.

On January 30th, 2008 at 2:14 pm adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

jean

so, did you want a longer leg? we can work on it. email me through my blog profile.

On January 30th, 2008 at 4:37 pm Tara said:

Jean,

I want your thin calves.

I measured mine, at 6 1/2 inches above the ankle, they are (sit yourself down), 17 inches. Heck, they are 11 inches at the smallest part above the ankle.

I think I’m adapting the pattern for foldovers (as usual).

On January 30th, 2008 at 7:36 pm Heather said:

Some days I wish I had standard issue feet.

My calves are 15 inches and even worse than that (well not really worse) my foot circumference is 10.5 inches. Like every other sock I’ve knit, I’ll just have to play with it to see if I can get the pattern to work over however many stitches I have to use.

On January 31st, 2008 at 3:40 am Jean said:

Well, thanks everyone for making me feel, well, “normal”! All my life I have felt as though my legs were HUGE - had to buy a larger size in dance tights (a long, LONG time ago) and then panty hose (remember those-ha!). Now I see I am just “average”. So, maybe we need to get the sock designers to think about this when they create patterns. Wonder where they got these averages from?

On January 31st, 2008 at 5:01 am adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

i think most of us don’t want to think about having to cast on 90-100+ sts (depending on the pattern) for socks! LOL!

hey, gals, we can work out some numbers for you. my only concern is that you could possibly run out of yarn, especially if you have longer feet. you might just want to go with the shorter leg socks

On February 1st, 2008 at 7:19 am Jean said:

Oh My Gosh! I didn’t realize until yesterday that I was communicationg with the creative goddess of design! Thanks for giveing us all thes helpful words of wisdom between your flashes of genius.

On February 1st, 2008 at 9:04 am adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

“creative goddess of design” **LOL** i like that! you are too sweet.

On February 1st, 2008 at 9:19 am adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

jean- i almost forgot this suggestion.

you might want to try knitting the sock with the large size leg but use one size larger needle to get a slightly looser gauge-maybe 7.5-8 sts/inch. this might give you enough stretch for your calf. you can also change to a smaller needle size at the point where your leg slims down. then, on the last repeat, skip the the yo’s on round 25…this will decrease your sts count down to 66…and then you can continue the sock using the instructions for the medium size. just be aware that all this will result in differences in striping and pooling as you change the number of sts and gauge. but you might end up with a sock that fits your foot.

On February 1st, 2008 at 9:40 am Tara said:

Adrienne - those of us with well endowed calves think nothing of that many stitches, well we don’t if want socks to fit.

I sat down with the pattern last night, and think I’m going to add 2 more repeats to the large size, but obviously knit them a bit shorter.

I may have to resort to a heel flap (way more friendly for adjusting size between above the ankle and below), but will try the original heel first. I just have to figure out how to drop the extra 24 stitches after the heel.

Hmm, skipping the last YO in the lace pattern would drop me 8 stitches each repeat….

Off to measure my foot just after the heel (high instep, so the graduated decrease may work).

On February 2nd, 2008 at 6:59 am Tara said:

Doh, While the math works in theory (1 repeat on the calf, dropping the last YO of each lace set), I’ve realised it will mess up the number of stitches for lace pattern.

But more K stitches between the 6 repeats will work better, since I can lose the 8 stitches and still be able to knit the lace pattern.

I’m giving this a try when I start.

On February 2nd, 2008 at 4:42 pm adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

tara- that could work too. not sure how to decrease those extra sts and make it look like part of the pattern though.

On February 3rd, 2008 at 9:04 am Tara said:

Adrienne - After I wrote it I had another Doh moment. If I have extra knit stitches between the lace motifs, my decrease on the line can be any where. I don’t have to drop the last YO, just add a decrease.

Cast on 96. The first 11 rows of lace pattern knit with 16 stitches (extra K4), with row 11 having k3tog instead of the k2tog (90 stitches). Then recentre the lace motifs from rows 15-25 over two stitches (so I don’t end up with broad knit columns up the piece). Row 25 as row 11 with a triple decrease (84 stitches). Recentre and repeat rows 1-12 with the triple decrease (78 stitches), and do the heel as written.

Then I have only 6 more stitches to eliminate over the foot, and since my foot is 12 inches at the instep and 10 at the ball, my foot seems to dictate a decrease down the foot would work as well.

My only debate right now is the extra decrease in the repeat of 1-11, I may want more stitches on the foot side of the heel. I’m sure I can get away with that repeat as I don’t have long feet, I’m not sure with only 12 motifs on the foot if that’s my best option. And there is the probabilty of me having 16 lace motis on the top of my foot, since heel and underfoot are a constant.

On February 6th, 2008 at 5:03 am adrienne in the bellybutton of california said:

hey, tara

how are your mods working? i think you can get by with the large instructions once you get to the foot. getting to that point is the “adventure.”

On February 6th, 2008 at 8:24 am Tara said:

Adrienne, I haven’t had a chance to start them …yet. I’m a process knitter big time, and if I don’t have self imposed rules…..there wouldn’t be enough needles on this planet.

Those rules include only one type of garment at a time. I’m nearly finished my current pair of socks, so I should be able to cast on these later this week.

The plus side to being process? If it isn’t working out, I have no issues in ripping it out and trying again, and again.

On February 15th, 2008 at 6:17 am Heather said:

I’m well into the foot of my first sock (I have calves that are 15″). So far they fit. What I did was knit the ribbing and the first lace repeat with 3mm needles. I switched to 2.5mm needles for the rest of the leg and foot.

Like I said it seems to be working for me so far. Hopefully I won’t run out of yarn before I run out of foot.

On February 18th, 2008 at 5:25 pm Heather said:

Well I didn’t run out of yarn but it was close, I only had about 10 yds left.

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