WIP: Mare Nostrum, a lovely pair of socks using the Fleegle heel

I love learning new techniques and often find myself foolishly attempting something that is not half as good as the standard well-tried methods. For the socks I'm currently knitting, I decided to go with the Fleegle heel, even though I thought this was probably a bad idea. It turns out that, at least on my feet, this heel has a really great fit. It's also super easy to execute, so I couldn't be happier with this experiment. I highly recommend this heel, it's easier to work and has a better fit than the standard short-row heel.

If you'd like the recipe I'm using, here it is:

Toe

Cast-on: 2x12 Judy’s magic CO.
Round 1: purl all stitches,
Rounds 2-5, increase rounds: p1, incr1, purl to last st of half, incr1, p1, twice.
Then,
Even rounds: purl all sts,
Odd rounds: increase round (as above). Until 60 st total.

Foot

I’ve added 2nd colour after finishing toe: k15 in the old colour and then added new (in the middle of the bottom of the sock). Then, I alternated colours and the following two rounds:
Round 1: p1, (sl1, p7)x3, sl1, p4, p30
Round 2: p5, (sl1, p7)x3, sl1, p30

I’m using the helix method to avoid jogs in the colour changes.

I’ve worked 30 double rounds. Then started Fleegle heel using white yarn.

Heel gusset

Increase round: k2, incr1, knit to last to sts of heel, incr1, k2, knit instep in pattern.
Alternate increase rounds with straight rounds until there are 59sts in heel alone. I’m treating the heel sts as the ones in between the first and last long sts. Thus, before starting heel, there are 31 sts on heel and 29 sts on the instep.

Just to be clear, I’m working increases in every white round.

Heel turn

Use the 59sts between 1st and last long sts as heel sts. Knit to middle st, then:
p2, ssp or p2tog, p1, turn,
sl1, k6, k2tog, k1, turn
Then,
sl1, p to st before gap, ssp or p2tog, p1, turn
sl1, k to st before gap, k2tog, k1, turn
Until all 59 heel sts have been taken care of.

I ended with 33sts on heel instead of 31.
At this point, in order to close the gap, I knit the last st together with the 1st long st (ssp), which happens to be of the desired colour out of pure luck. I’ll do the same with the last long st and the 1st of the heel (p2tog), which again is of the right colour, this time blue. Again this was mainly luck that my helix knitting colour change happened to be in the middle of the instep sts.

Leg

Knit 18 double rounds in pattern.

Then, 18 rounds of 2x2 rib with white yarn only. Finally, finish with Lori’s twisted bind-off.

Lori’s twisted bind-off is another new technique I'm trying out. Because I'm not a big fan of Jenny's surprising stretchy bind off (JSSBO). The latter is pretty ugly and flairs a bit. Both things are supposed to be fixed by Lori's. The verdict? Very attractive but not very elastic. Lori’s nearly doesn’t go through my heel. For socks, I think I’ll go back to JSSBO, because, even though it’s pretty ugly, it’s a lot more elastic and even if it flairs, it’s not visible while wearing. However, I suspect that Lori's is a great bind off for other purposes, which require elasticity, but not too much, and where beauty is more important, for example, ribbing in sweaters.

In the second sock, I’ve inverted the order of the slip stitches in order to get mirror images. This means that when working the heel, right at the end, we have the wrong colours to do the final ssp and p2tog. This is not a problem, I just have to knit ahead and wait for the right colour to do the last couple of decreases.

Also, my colour changes were in the middle of the heel this time. I frogged the necessary blue stitches in order to make sure the blue yarn is attached to an instep stitch and doesn't go under the heel.