Dad's Socks

 It has been several years since I made my Dad any knit socks.  This spring, since I was knitting a pair of socks for my Mom to surprise her with for Mother's Day using some of the free Zauberball yarn she had gotten for me, I decided it was nigh time to make my Dad a new pair of socks also.

He has wool allergies, so I wouldn't be using any of the Zauberball for him, even though there are several skeins of it in manly colors.  Instead, I dug into my stash of cotton fingering that I bought in the past just for him.  I pulled out two colors: Doe and Marlin, intending to do contrasting cuffs, heels and toes.

Well, I got distracted when I was casting on and grabbed the Doe (main color) instead of the Marlin, and had knit the entire cuff before I realized my mistake.  I was using the Deflect pattern, which is rather more involved of a cuff than I typically have on sock patterns, and I wasn't about to tear it all out and start again in the intended (contrast) color.  So I 'personalized' the socks by doing only contrasting heels and toes, LOL.

I have knit this pattern before, without adding in any contrasting yarn parts, so I was confident I could adapt the pattern for them despite my screwing up of the cuff color.  What I didn't fully realize was that I was heading into the busy growing/gardening/riding/being-outside-all-the-time season and that this somewhat complicated pattern might not be the best project to try to do and have finished by Father's Day.

And it wasn't.  I got sock #1 finished in April.Things were still looking good for my Father's Day deadline at that point.  But the second sock, well, it was delay after delay after delay from early May on in terms of finding time to work on it.  The week before Father's Day arrived, and I was only halfway through the (men's size 10) foot.  I thought maybe, if I pushed, I could get it done in time.  I looked at the plethora of tasks with my name on them, and stressedover how, exactly, to push knitting that sock.

One week before Father's Day

Then, two days later, I had a revelation in three parts: 

1. I wasn't going to be seeing my Dad on Father's Day itself.  
2. He had no clue (and neither did anyone else) that I was knitting him socks for a present (most years I don't get my parents presents).
3. I would be seeing him the Saturday after Father's Day and could surprise him with socks then.

Phew!  That gave me a whole extra week to work on that second sock!  And, with DH being out of town for that entire 'extra' week, I could (hopefully) use the time I wasn't spending on normal taking-care-of-DH tasks (cooking his eggs for breakfast {I typically eat yogurt and granola, so actually 'make' two breakfasts every day since DH doesn't eat yogurt or granola}, packing his lunch on in-office days, emptying and putting away his lunch box after said in-office days,  doing his laundry {half the people, half the # of loads}) and apply that to knitting Dad's sock.  Because really, if I looked at the breakfast and lunch packing/putting away lunch box time alone, it added up to like 2.5 extra hours I should theoretically have available!

(Which also made me really look at labor distribution as empty nesters and conclude that perhaps we need to have a meal responsibility related chat in the near future. . . )

You know what?  I got that sock done!  

two days after Father's Day

They are now washed, blocked, and ready for surprising Dad with this afternoon.  😁

Finished and blocking on the clothesline.