Sock Madness Round Two began on Thursday afternoon at 5 pm. I had my yarn all ready and I cast on before Dale got home from work. We went out to supper that night and I brought the sock-in-progress with me and worked on it between bites. By the time I went to bed Thursday night I had completed the cuff and leg.

Friday morning I got up early and knit the heel flap and gusset before work. I did the gusset decreases and much of the foot during lunch and sock one was finished shortly after I got home from work Friday afternoon. I immediately cast on sock two and worked on it throughout the rest of the afternoon and evening. I really thought I could finish it that night but by 11:30 pm I couldn’t keep my eyes open and my hands and wrists were screaming for relief so I called it quits.

Saturday morning I was up at 5 am and sock two was finished a little after 6 am. I beat my opponent and I have now advanced to Round Three.

The pattern is called Madtini and it was designed by Karin Bole. I really love the cuff and the leg is a series of oblique spirals which work really well with handpainted yarn. The foot is all stockinette and it was nice to see how the yarn worked up in that as well.

The yarn I used is from Scout’s Swag in the colorway “Snow Bunny” and it went so fast because it’s sport weight. It’s an excellent color combination and I found it quite entertaining to watch the blue, brown and white alternate. There was no pooling or flashing and, even though I have made my peace with pooling, I do prefer that it doesn’t happen at all.

I’ve been rather surprised at how seriously I’ve taken this competition. Going into this I just thought I wanted to get past Round One and I thought I’d be satisfied with that. But once I did that I realized that I really wanted to advance another round and pushed myself way beyond my normal knitting boundaries, taking Tylenol for the hand discomfort and staying up late and getting up early just to stay ahead of my opponent. I’m telling myself that I won’t do this when Round Three rolls along but, being the overachiever that I am, who do I think I’m kidding?