So far I'd just knit a tube of stockinette. I planned to do an afterthought heel, I remember seeing the technique sometime in the last couple years either in a knitting book or a blog or something. Anyway, it didn't seem like it would be too hard to figure out so I threw caution to the wind and hunkered down to do it last night. (Throwing caution to the wind, because with no internet at home I couldn't get any hints once I started.)
So, I knit the heel to be added in, exactly the same way as I knit the toe.
With the length of the heel staring me in the face I had a better time guessing how long to make the foot (these won't be for me, so I made them a little longer than I would for myself). I took two spare circs and picked up the stitches on either side of my chosen row,
held my breath and snipped the row in between.
At this point I am using 6 circular needles - finally justifying the ridiculous number of 2 mm needles I have!
After that, I grafted the heel on and voila!
The grafting took a lot longer than I expected, and dealing with the corners of the heel was a PITA, as usual for me. Regardless of the method of construction, I always get a hole on one side of the heel. Anyway, the hole in this case is no better or worse than usual for me, so I suppose it could be hole-free in the hands of a more careful knitter.
Anyway I am pretty pleased with the result, the socks are going to be the right length and I can use every last drop of this yarn. I'm so sick of seeing it in my stash I don't want any leftovers hehehe.
In preparation of this post, I checked around and it seems that "afterthought heel" technique is done slightly differently by different folks, though the others that I saw in my quick search picked up the stitches from the tube and knit the heel off of it rather than grafting it on. Oh well, since I kinda like grafting I don't mind the extra work I made for myself. Perhaps I'll try it the more usual way for the second sock.
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