I walked, I knit, I made a sock.

Saturday morning, I went for a four mile training walk with my girlfriends, as I am supposed to be doing this big relay in five weeks. My feet ached for the remainder of the weekend.

I'm not sure if the walk is going to happen for me. I took a chair to the dog park (normally, the owners stand around or stroll). I sat through the songs at the Sunday church service. When you're measuring out how much pain you're in vs. how many steps and how much standing time it requires to prepare your next meal, that's pretty serious. Also, much of the knitting kit and the stash is on floor two of the house, and I was on floor one. When you consider whether you need to make a trip to the second story of your own house to continue to knit, that's bad.

I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. I consulted my podiatrist earlier this year. I got orthotics. I got new shoes. I'm wearing the orthotics and the new shoes. I iced, I used OTC anti-inflammatory drugs. I'm going to go see my internist on Thursday. Is surgery a good solution for my feet? Blecch. Maybe after August. I am too young to feel this bad.

Anybody out there want to walk a few miles and do a little sleep deprivation with my friends later this summer? Email me at lorirode AT gmail DOT com. I'll knit you some leg warmers, if you'll go get my yarn.

Saturday afternoon, I visited Tangle, a great LYS, which does not have a website, as far as I can tell. (Otherwise I would link to it. They're in Lake Oswego. There is free parking nearby. They carry Blue Moon. They have social knitting on Sunday afternoons, 2-5 pm.) I ran into Judy, who writes a blog that I admire greatly. Her fabulous blog, entitled Persistent Illusion, is here. I felt so pleased with myself for 1) identifying her by the overheard comments (son, music) and sock project in her hand, and 2) introducing myself. They are terrific and pleasant people in the shop. Great teenagers there, too.

I had to buy some yarn for my One Skein Secret Pal's July gift. I was thinking purples, as I have a set of purple stitch markers to send her, and some beautiful post-it notes in purple. I was also thinking Blue Moon's Socks that Rock. I love that yarn. It is a joy to work with and generous amount of yardage per skein. They didn't have a nice solid purple (I think I was remembering 'Star Sapphire'), so I got a colorway entitled 'Mist'. Judy put a photo of it up at her website. I got my OSSP one skein and I got one for myself. I was also tempted by 'Scaponia' but it had orange, and that was similar to the last skein I got for my pal.)

I had started my Class Sock from Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks book. (Thanks for the tip, Stephanie.) I used the free yarn that I had on hand, so my stupid little worsted weight non-wearable sock looks great. I made several errors. That's OK. That's what practice socks are for. I used two circulars. It worked great. My errors were: carrying yarn in front during the heel stitch, so that part looks wonky, and lousy picking up of stitches along the edge of the heel flap for the gusset. One side of the picked up stitches looks great; the other is awful. How does that happen? And why didn't I go back and do it right?

Because it was a flippin' practice sock and it didn't really matter! I know how to pick up stitches. Besides, the color changing yarn made it look worse than it might have. No one's going to wear the thing. I might stuff it and let it become a dog or cat toy. I might add a drawstring and let it become a bag for storing game tiles.

By the time I was at Tangle, I had turned the heel, and decreased for the gusset, but not yet completed the body of the sock or grafted the toes. Judy was there, working on her Lapis socks, which have since been renamed to Tangled Up In Blue. They are so beautiful. Judy was very encouraging to me and explained the pattern for the leg of the sock, which looked so complicated to me, but turns out to be quite simple. She also gave me permission to work the ankle in straight ribbing if I wanted to.

I may do Judy's sock next, as I want to try doing two socks at once, using two circulars. I also want to try her cast-on technique and try a toe-up version. A couple of the Schurch socks are really appealing to me, too, so we'll see.

Oh, and while I was doing my three inches of ribbing for the ankle of my first practice sock, I knew I had been entered by the spirit of Hermione, when I thought to myself, "You know, you could just do a few decreases right here and this would be a lovely little preemie hat."

House-elf hats are everywhere. They get into your blood.