Afterthought Heel

I finished the second helix sock 'tube' today and, inspired by Arne and Carlos' video on the subject, started the afterthought heel. 

I did mine a little differently because I didn't knit waste yarn at the spot where I wanted the heel to start. Instead, I just measured up from the toe to where I started the same type of heel on another sock and ran needles through the stitches on either side of the row I was going to remove. In this case it is the turquoise row. I then snipped the centre of a turquoise stitch in that row and unravelled the yarn ends to each side.

With the turquoise yarn pulled out stitch by stitch, the black stitches are left freed up on each side of my Magic loop cable.

I then join the yarn I will use for the heel and knit one row, weaving*in the turquoise yarn ends as I go. Then do decreases like I would for the toe: K1, ssk, knit to three from the end of that needle, k2tog, k1, turn and do the same on the other side. Alternate this with a knit round until you have about 1/3 of the stitches on one side left in the middle of the heel. Graft these stitches closed and your afterthought heel is complete. I noticed Arne doesn't do an ssk (left-leaning decrease) on the right side of the heel. I guess he doesn't care how the decreases lean.

This type of heel is great for any sock where you don't want to interrupt the striping pattern on the instep.

Here are the two helix tubes I knit. 

And this is where the afterthought heel is positioned. It really is like knitting a toe where the heel goes.

The heel rounds out when you put on the sock. I guess if you wanted to reinforce the heel you could add an extra strand of that nylon yarn or do an 'eye of partridge' stitch on the bottom of the heel. 

I just did regular knitting. Any little holes at the corner can be darned closed.

It looks and feels great on.

I've started the heel on the second sock and only have a few more rows before I finish it. I may start another pair of these helix socks, this time with a ribbed leg.

I could have used some waste yarn like Arne did but I didn't want to decide where I wanted the heel to start until I had finished knitting the whole tube.

The key to a very cool helix pattern is high contrast. I used a very bright yarn and contrasted with a much darker. Whenever the two colours got too similar, I just pulled the darker yarn until I got a good contrast again. Truth be told, I ran out of the Poems yarn and found a ball of Fame Trend yarn with the same dark tones. One can't really tell where I started the other dark yarn.

This is a great pattern for using up partial balls of yarn or even scraps of yarn. They were fun and easy to knit. I love trying out new techniques and they don't have to be challenging to be fun.

* I learned a different way to weave in yarn ends as I knit the new colour from this Stephen West video. He calls it "Weavin' Stephen".