Tea Socks or why Santa always checks the list twice

I found the perfect combination of yarn colorway name and pattern name. I found the yarn on one of my Rose City Yarn crawls. I bought Barnyard Knits fingering yarn in the Lemongrass Tea colorway. Can I just say my color appreciation has vastly improved as a knitter. I once hated orange and yellow but now have learned to appreciate many different colors that I would have turned my nose up at before. (I will also like to note I changed the way I say things. I don't call things ugly anymore, they are simply not my taste. No use calling something ugly when we all know someone out there loves it, just not me.) I think this color is one of my newly acquired tastes. The flecks of dark brown just stole my heart and I will admit to being influenced by colorway names too. Lemongrass tea, doesn't it just make you feel the warm sun as you sit in your lush peaceful garden sipping a cup of relaxing tea? Ahh I'm just going to sit here for a minute more.

And on with our story, then one day I found a pattern called My Cup of Tea Socks by Robin Lynn. The sample socks were a delicate tan color that the designer had dyed with a variety of tea bags. Since it made a fragrant yarn it clicked in my head I had the perfect yarn.

 I cast on and started knitting and taking pictures to share with some friends, 

I managed to get one of the great yarn color complexity. 

Well you can tell where I do a lot of my knitting and texting with friends can't you?

My sock grew and I was still in love. I finished the first one and cast on the second. I even took it to a local knitting meet up and knit on it. 

Then my brain started twitching. I am an oddity in the sock knitting world. I work my socks on many more stitches than most knitters, at least if you look at a lot of sock patterns. I think I grew up with so many ill fitting socks that I cannot tolerate snug socks. But hey that is the best thing about knitting I get to make socks the way I like. 

But recently I've noticed my socks have been a bit too loose. And now it is bothering me too. So for this sock I decided to decrease my gusset a bit more to make it a tiny bit more snug.

I was such a good knitter that I even made note of it. I know I was shocked too.

I was only a repeat or two away from starting the heel when my brain picked a fight with me. It kept popping up and saying Hey didn't we decrease the first sock?

So I checked my notes and admitted we did. I sucked it up this morning and ripped back to the cuff after I took the sad picture above. Well at least I remembered before I knit the whole thing and it didn't match the first one. 

But my brain would not let me knit happily on. Hey this feels funny I don't remember doing the decreases this way. Why don't I remember this?

So I checked my notes again. I had clearly noted the decreased stitch amount for the foot only! Dag Nab It! I have ripped back for nothing. At least my brain only let me knit 4 rounds before yelling at me to check it again.

But now for something I have been able to do right. I reset my Rhinebeck room to have a nice little knitting corner with a conveniently placed bowl of Mellie. She is graciously consented to be my "At Elbow" assistant. 

Hopefully no more mistakes will be made with my February socks and I will be able to get back on our non-existent knitting schedule. So my friends knit on with authority and never be afraid to check your notes twice, or three times, however many times it takes to do the job right. I'm starting a 12 hour waiting period on all ripping back.