A Parade of Dad Socks

A parade of Dad socks is less colourful than most sock parades - but it is every bit as satisfying.

These are winging their way to my dad now and I hope they keep his toes toasty. Particularly because as far as I can tell it has snowed pretty much every day in New Brunswick since winter began (possibly before).



The grey socks are the Retro Rib socks from Favourite Socks. The yarn is a brand called St Ives which I've never used before. It knit up nicely and feels soft enough.

The blue socks are Regia yarn 4 ply, and a sort of faded denim blue colour in real life. They are a simplified variation of the Retro Rib.

The final pair are also Regia - but in this case the yarn is a 6ply (DK weight) self patterning one which is ideal for knitting up into a plain stockinette stitch pair of socks.

As I do with pretty much any knitted gift I finished the socks off with some custom labels before I sent them off.

I love these labels. They often get as many ooohs and ahhs as the knitting and I think they help make the socks look that little bit more special.

Labels are a great opportunity to pimp your knitting (I often use the back of the label to highlight the number of stitches, or the special qualities of the yarn or why I selected the pattern or...) and it's a great place to give some handy advice on care and washing.


I use postcard (4x6 inch) paper which works well folded over and tied to the socks with a thin ribbon. Rymans has A4 card paper that is perforated and separates into 3 postcards (they have a handy word template that helps with layout) and I use that, or if I only want a single label I use 6x4 inch photo paper/printing. I've also just seen some business card size paper that would be great for smaller labels.



6 Quirks of Soo

I was tagged by Sue to come up with 6 quirky but uninteresting facts about me. I have done this one once before -- but am pleased to report that my life is full of uninteresting things so an encore wasn't much of a stretch.

So here we go!

1) My name is Susan, and I have no problem at all with people shortening my name to 'Sue' when talking to or about me. But it makes me feel sort of ooky (for no reason that makes any sense) seeing my name written as 'Sue' (particularly when written with my last name). It's Susan (at work or on any document) or Soo (everywhere else).

Irrational and quirky. Does this count for 2?

2) I adopted Soo as the spelling of my shortened name when I was about 13 years old. Friends came up with it while writing epic poems about me which generally went something like this:
I have a friend named Soo
We went to the zoo
To watch cows go moo
Do yoo
Want to come too?

3) When I was in grade 3 I won 3rd prize (25 bucks! and a pen) in a short story competition at the Canadian National Exhibition. My short story was a feminist tale of a couple of boys who are shown up by a girl they tried to exclude from their tree house club.

4) I am annoyingly punctual. Even when I'm meeting someone who I KNOW will be late, I have to be there on time (generally a bit early)(just to be sure) in case they do turn up on time.

5) Conversely I have little patience for people who are habitually late. And I can get very cross when the start of a meeting or other event is held up while we wait for the people who couldn't be bothered to get there on time. (And it is always the same people.)

6) I like to knit. (I know I've shared this quirk with you before. But it's a biggie.)

I challenge you all to come up with 6 less interesting facts about yourself.