"A Cranking Visitor......"

Last week sometime, I read a request on one of my Yahoo Sock Machine Groups, from a woman who was asking if someone in the Madison area would allow her to come and check out their Circular Sock Machine, as she is contemplating purchasing one.

I wrote and volunteered, so last Friday, Karen, along with her 3 young sons, came by for a "cranking lesson". ;)

Here she is, with her youngest son looking on, as she "picks up" her hung hem stitches.

I made her look up for a photo, too. :)

I walked her through all the steps of a sock, beginning with the hung hem, then the length of the leg, knitting a heel (decreasing and increasing stitches), the length of the foot, and finally, decreasing stitches for the beginning of the toe. Something went wrong and a stitch was dropped. I am not able to pick up a stitch from the toe or heel area if my life depended on it, so I wasn't able to get her back on track. Instead, we knitted some scrap yarn onto it , leaving the dropped stitches (and probably adding a few more). Karen would take it home, rip out the tangled mess until she came back to her stitches for the foot, and re-knit the toe by hand. She's knitted quite a few socks by hand so will be able to complete the sock.

I'd say she was quite successful for her first time at a CSM. She was going to another persons house the following day, who has the same brand of machine that she is interested in buying, so hopefully, she was able to crank out the 2nd sock at that time.