The "Good and Plenty Socks" are done...and so are the needles!

I finished the "Good and Plenty" socks this evening! Wahoo - another finished object!




I'm so thankful that these are finally finished - the needles I was using were a royal pain in the backside! I tried a new type of double point this time rather than my usual bamboo. These needles are made of Surina wood....they're lovely to look at and are comparable in slickness to the Crystal Palace bamboo DPNs (my personal favorite). Ugh! What a mistake! The edges of the needles split frequently and I was constantly filing them down with my emery board or "switching" sides of the needles as it would "catch" and "tear" at the yarn. As a result, I had to knit rather slowly.

I was about half-way through the first sock when the problem with the needles became apparent. At that point, I found that filing them helped....and I continued knitting. By the time I reached the toe of the first sock, however, I was questioning my commitment to these needles. The frequency of the "catching" and "splitting" was increasing. It was too late to change needles though - I'd already completed one sock with these needles. I needed to knit the second sock with the same needles....for consistency. (I've found that even if needles are the EXACT same size, the slickness impacts how tight or loose I knit just as much as the slight size variations.)

At first I thought that the problem may just be a "bad batch" of needles, but no one I knew had ever used needles made from Surina wood, so I couldn't confirm that theory. When I posted a query about the needles on Angel Yarns Forum, I got my answer. (The forum is associated with a fabulous on-line shop - Angel Yarns) A couple of the girls on the forum HAD tried these needles with the same results....neither intends to use them again. Another thing I noticed about the needles was they they bent and distorted more quickly than my Crystal Palace needles. These needles are DEFINITELY going into permanent "time out" - I'm "finished" with them!