Make do and mend

I think that one thing that puts people off knitting socks is the thought of hand knitting something that takes so much punishment. Having worn through a few heels myself I can testify that socks definitely have a shorter shelf life than say a scarf or hat (although you are much less likely to leave them on the bus).

Happily, so long as you catch your socks before they have worn through entirely, they're pretty easy to mend.



Whenever you finish a pair of socks try to keep back a couple of metres of the yarn for mending. You can put it in the drawer where you keep the spare buttons from your shirts and trousers, all neatly labelled (what, you don't do that??). Even if you're the sort of person who knits their socks toe-up until the last inch of yarn is gone you can always use a similar yarn. In fact you don't even need to be too careful about matching the colour given that the mend is going to be on the base of your heel.



Look at the edge of the worn patch that is furthest away from the toe to see where the stitches start to wear thin then count back two rows so that your patch is anchored in firm stitches.

Thread a yarn needle with your mending yarn, then beginning two or three stitches to the right of the worn stitches start to work duplicate stitch following the path of the original stitches in order to reinforce them.

Work until you reach the firm stitches on the left hand side of the patch then move on to the next row and work back in the same way, making sure that you weave the yarn through the new stitches created on the last row. Continue working back and forth like this until you have reached the firm stitches on the toe side of the worn bit and then secure the yarn.

There are pics for this method here. For more traditional darning check out this item from Sky News (there are some great knitting shots!).