MUMTUS meets Sleepytime Swirl Hat. After searching and printing out numerous sock patterns, I settled on using the MUMTUS system to figure out the stitch count and then borrowed the diagonal rib from the swirl hat. I found the “Baby Cynthia’s Hat” (http://www.ravelry.com/projects/DesignatedKntr/swirl-hat) and neighbor baby (http://www.ravelry.com/projects/bothrileys/swirl-hat)
were shown in the Oracle coral and turquoise yarn and it showed off the colors to advantage. There is a trend in Twisted Sister’s Oracle yarn projects to use the stitch pattern from the Swirl Hat, a free project by Mandie Harrington. Maybe it was sent with the packaged matching yarn and onesie kits?

Note that the yarn calls for size 3-6 needles and I am using 1s and 1.5s for a much smaller, tighter fabric.*

First, I made my slip knot at the color change from coral to turquoise, and did the long tail cast-on with the coral color on the thumb side so the I ended up with a coral edge at the top. When the colors began to shift to blue, I switched the threads by twisting the thumb thread to the loops around the needle and used the thread from the ball which was coral colored then, to do the thumb twists. This gave a red lip to the entire edge, like the colored accent on a Chihuly bowl.

After making ten rows of 1x1 rib for the cuff, I set up the design with a single row of plain stockinette. I counted eight stitches and placed markers so that there were three groups of eight stitches on each of my three needles. (72 total).

Addendum: It seams that I didn’t like the ribbing at the end so I took it off by cutting the yarn below the rib and reloading the last row of stitches onto the needles and then switched to a plain blue ribbed top. It did look a little muddled with the mix of colors next to the pretty pooling. Or maybe I needed more yarn? Cannot remember and didn’t include this in the notes. Sorry.

The yarn is pooling into a spiral that flows across the rib and appears to climb diagonally in the opposite direction. It’s not exactly the same look as the hats, but it is pretty and I think I like it even better. (I’m wondering if I can get it to go the reverse direction for the other sock, or if I were to change directions so that the rib becomes a zigzag, how would the pooling react?)

I wanted to show off the Twisted Sister paint on the cuff, so I am going to knit from the top down. I plan to use the solid blue for the toes and heels and keep the paint going where it will show the most, or if it doesn’t seem to be lasting long enough I’ll finish the toe end with solid blue if/when the paint runs out.

I may try to riff into a fitted arch. I have downloaded everything I thought might apply in order to accomplish that!

Oracle is superwash merino and bamboo, but it feels more like knitting with cotton yarn. Not bad, but drier or less smooth flowing through my hands, but I love the color and I hope they wash up nicely when finished.

• The Toe-up Self-striping Socks (http://www.ravelry.com/projects/LAHR/mash-up-magic-toe-up...) I made Mer before came out a bit too loosely knitted so I fiddled with gauge first, and ended up with the rib on size 1 needles, then switched to 1.5s for the body of the sock, basing the stitch count on the chart and measurements of the MUMTUS method.