Yep, you read that right. There's a pattern called Herding Cats and I have all the yarn you need for it.
Photo courtesy of Stone Knits, who has many other awesome patterns to peruse too!
This pattern is one that MANY of you have reached out over the past month and asked for color ideas. Most of you are going with a combo of solid colors in Cascade Heritage and a bit of variegated colors in the form of mini skeins from Emma's Yarn. And, as luck would have it, both of those things just came in this week!
Now, I think a combo of hand dyed colors and solids are best for these socks. It could be that you have some nice bits of stash you can use for your cats. But if you don't, here's where I'd start. You want a main color that will really stand out because there are eyes and paws and tails that are just one stitch wide and will get lost if your main sock color is anything close to the cats. A solid color for the main, as even a slightly tonal color will muddle the lines of the tails and eyes. So the aqua shown here, something like Cascade Heritage 5630 or 5763, is a great contrast. One of you said you were making them for your sister who wanted a hunter green, and I think that would work too. So would pink, yellow.... well, lots of things as long as your cats aren't at all close in color. You don't want cats without eyes, right?
For the cats, there are lots of oranges, grays, whites and black that you could do in both the Emma's Minis or Cascade Heritage. Even browns. I think the color Coffee Grounds by Madelinetosh would make a perfect brown cat color. We have that on Tosh Sock, Merino Light and Twist Light, so if you wanted something for another project you can use the rest for whatever. But these socks are all your own, so you could go with a black sock and neon cats, or a white sock with red and green cats - sky's the limit! And we do have the neon colors from Cascade Heritage back in stock - there are several starting with number 5772.
It's apt that the name of this pattern is Herding Cats since I'm sitting in my son's school parking lot typing this up as I'm about to coach elementary school volleyball, which is a lot like... herding cats. 22 little kittens with bouncy balls who have more energy than I ever remember having in my life! When Terry and I coached Henry's Y Ball team a few years ago, we joked that he was the actual coach (and he was the basketball player and I know next to nothing about the sport) and I was the child wrangler. Pretty much the same things as herding cats.
What?! This is an amazing pattern!
Posted by: Ashley Mattes | February 17, 2023 at 11:52 AM
I found a shorty sock pattern creator named Summer Lee, and her patterns look so cute! This has given me ideas what kind of yarn to get :-). Happy Knitting!
Posted by: Donna Norris | February 17, 2023 at 07:10 PM