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On Heels and Toes

Several of you asked about how to make the heel on the sock knitter. Admittedly, it's much easier to just crank and crank and make a long tube. Leg warmers, anyone?

The needles can be pulled up and "out of service". To make a heel (and toes are just like heels, actually), you pull about half the needles up and knit back and forth, instead of round and round. Each time you knit a row on the heel, you pull one more needle up (to decrease) until you get to the point of the heel. Then you begin pushing a needle down each time you knit a row (to increase). Here's a photo of half the needles up and half down--at the beginning of the heel.


Here's a view down into the knitter. You can see the heel has been formed, and is bunched up along the bottom of the photo. Whenever you work on a sock, you need to hang a weight on it (or pull downward with your hand). When you're making the heel, additional weights need to be hung on the heel part (and moved up every few rows while working on the heel). The heel weights are attached to old silver forks with the tines bent over. Apparently, silver tableware bends better than stainless.


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