A Quick Toe-Up Sock Calculator

Have you ever wanted to knit plain socks for yourself or someone in your family but you aren’t sure how to get started with the math?

Henriette at Eddie’s Room has designed a super sock calculator that does all the math for you to work a toe-up sock in just about any size using Judy’s Magic Cast On.

Just change the sizing in the first box and the numbers throughout the post will update, showing you how many stitches to cast on, when to start the heel turn and how to do it. If you have a shorter foot, or a wider foot or whatever, you can change those measurements or just use the standard measures if you’re knitting for someone whose foot isn’t available for measuring.

Of course you still need to check your gauge with the yarn you are using, as the calculator assumes 26 stitches per 4 inches, or 6.5 stitches per inch. If you’re getting something different you can change the number on the form and it will recalculate for you. Easy peasy.

Have you ever used an online knitting pattern calculator before? I’d love to hear how it worked for you (and Henriette is looking for testers for the adult sizes on her calculator, so if you try it out please let her know).

[Photo via Eddie’s Room.]

For the past few years I’ve taken part in a Christmas in July blog hop that encourages people to get a jump on their making for holiday gifts.

I love to use yarn I already have for these projects in the hope that people will consider what they already have that they can use to make projects for themselves or to give as gifts.

This year it was a couple of knit baskets made using partial balls of yarn left in my stash from other projects.

They use the same basic pattern but the first one is made with two colors of bulky yarn, and the second used two strands of worsted weight yarn held together, which made the gauge about the same, but I cast on fewer stitches to make a smaller version.

The bottom of the basket is square, though you can make them rectangular if you’d rather. Then I just knit up the sides in rounds until I was about to run out of yarn. This gave both baskets rather short sides — maybe more like a tray than a basket — but you can keep knitting as long as you like to make the sides of your basket as tall as you want.

They’re worked in seed stitch, which keeps the edges from curling and adds a nice texture to the baskets.

Of course this also allows you to use even more odd balls from your stash. I’d love to make a big one someday combining lots of different yarn. I mean, I’d probably use it to store more yarn, but that’s a fine thing to do.

As it is, these little trays are great for sitting on your desk or bedside table to hold little things that always seem to appear there. I like to use one to hold the supplies for whatever project I’m working on, things like little scissors, my tape measure, a crochet hook, etc.

And they would make good gifts on their own or as a container to hold some other goodies if you like.

You can find the free pattern for these stash busting baskets over at Our Daily Craft.

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