Heavenly foot bags

I actually did it today.

After all of the sweat and tears, after days of sidelong glances and admiring stares, after fondling and wondering at their softness, I wore my socks today. Both indoors and out. At first, I thought "let no boot rub against my carefully constructed heel" But then, after wearing them around all morning in my birk's, it was walk time. Or at least "get me out of this house" time. One deep breath later, and my socks were in my boots. You have 4 kids cooped up all day when it is nice out and see how long you last. We walked to Victory, the locally owned meat/grocery store. Then on to the library to exchange a DVD. Then across the foot bridge to the walking trail and down river to the old converted train bridge. It was a balmy +6 C. The rest of the week looks about the same. I am so glad that winter, mild as it was, is loosing its grip. I think that everyone will sleep well tonight.

The socks held up well and my feet feel great in their new "foot bags". When my eldest was quite a bit younger, she enjoyed playing with words, Well, she still does. Everything that you say goes through a "how can I make this funny" filter. Some times this can be a good thing, sometimes it can be down right annoying. One day she decided that socks was too boring for her and renamed them "foot bags" What can I say? I kind of like it.

I am already thinking about what other soft yarns I have in stash that I can convert to socks. I should say soft FAT yarn. I think that there is a wool silk blend that I have had for years waiting for the perfect project. It is off white, and I inherited some turquoise so I think that they will end up in the dye pot.

I also got a great tip from a sock book (Knit Socks! by Betsy Lee McCarthy) checked out from the library. If you need to splice yarn with mostly wool content ( with the excecption of superwash types) you can easily do so by unraveling about one inch from each end, laying them together, apply enough spit ( I kid you not) to moisten and rub the splice rapidly between your palms. The combination of wet ( from the spit, but water would work as well I think) and heat and friction ( from rubbing your palms together) will felt the ends together. It took me about one minute of this to get the ends well felted and reduced in size to the original weight. Who knew?