More Socks. Can You Believe It?

I'm knitting another pair of socks.

It's the Riot of Color (Rav link) pattern from Around the World...  and I guess it's okay... I'm not loving it as much as I liked the Herringbone Socks or the By the Fjords I made for StrungUp at Christmas.  But it's good mindless television-watching knitting while the weather's too warm to work on Fireside.

This photo doesn't do justice to the beautiful colors of this sock yarn.  The blue/purple one (it's more blue than purple in real life, I think) is Happy Feet.  The blue-green one is a gorgeous hand-dyed creation from Fleur de Fiber, a yarn that is only available at Windy Knitty in Chicago.  My college-alumni-group Secret Santa sent it to me, and it is goooooorgeous.  I would definitely buy this yarn for myself (although I wish it had some nylon in it for strength; I fear a hole in the heel because the Fleur de Fiber is 100% wool).  Part of the point of this pattern is to use two very-saturated yarns that are pretty close together hue-wise, and I'm quite happy with the result.  Like I said, the photo doesn't really capture the great colorplay happening here.

This is a sock with both a gusset and a short-row heel, weirdly enough.  I guess it works in concept, but... meh.  The coolest part about this pattern is, regrettably, the cast-on edge, with this cool twisty-trick happening at the top of the sock.

Anyway, I'm a little more than halfway through the first sock.  It's moving along far more slowly than the Herringbone Socks, which I completed in a whopping five days.  The chart-following, I suppose, takes longer than just memorizing an 8-stitch pattern.

These might be a gift.  They might be for me.  I haven't decided.  I'll probably make them to fit me, but since I've got a pretty average-sized foot, I can give them to someone else if the mood strikes me.  I do have a few folks in mind.