Stormy, Tornadic Weather

Middle Tennessee had some tornadic weather last night. Although I did have the comforter and the flashlight ready for the small windowless bathroom, we didn't have to go in there. We fared just fine, no trees down either.
In all the weather turmoil, I did a little knitting and also a little spinning. I finished the first cop on the Stained Glass fiber. It's really pretty and spinning beautifully. Don't you agree?I also had a chance to work on my afterthought heel this week. If you've never done an afterthought heel, they are super easy. The trick is knowing where to start the heel. As you can see from the pics below, I put a piece of waste yarn in the row where the heel should go. Following the pics from left to right and top to bottom, I'll go through the steps:

1. Pick up the stitches in the row above the waste yarn and the row below the waste yarn. I start out with a snaller size dpn and then transfer the stitches to my knitting needle. I use 2 circulars but you can do this with dpn's as well and just put the stitches on the needles as you would for any other heel.

2. All stitches are now on the needles.

3. Get your scissors out and snip in the middle of the row where the waste yarn is, between the 2 rows of needles.

4. Start undoing that row. To the left and to the right. This gives you a little bit of yarn on each end to weave in.

5. All finished undoing the row and the live stitches are still nicely secured to the needles.

6. Knit the first round even and pick up an extra stitch or two on the sides to prevent a gap. Start decreasing as for a toe.

7. Kitchener stitch completed.

8. Close up of completed heel.

9. Sock is almost done, just have to finish the cuff.

Some people knit a row of waste yarn as they are knitting the tube, I just find it easier to knit the tube without stopping and then go back and decide where the heel goes. Even easier is to knit the heel and toe with a different color and then you wouldn't have to stop to make sure you had enough yarn as I had to do on this sock. I also knit the heel and toe with a strand of mohair to add strength, since mohair is nature's nylon. Hope this will help you brave an afterthought heel sometime.