Those Darned Socks!

I wear wool socks. That's pretty much all I have. If you have wool socks, you know as well as I do that they tend to wear out on the pressure points - the ball of the foot, and the back of the heel - pretty quickly.

With the price of good wool socks, though, it's not very cost-effective to just toss them once they get thin or get holes worn in them. That's why it's a good idea to learn the age-old practice of sock darning!



You don't need any special tools to fix your socks. Just a lightbulb to use as a darning "egg", a ball of washable wool sock yarn, and a darning needle, which you should be able to find at any fabric store or yarn shop.

It's best to catch your socks when they're just worn thin, but haven't actually gotten holes in them. You can still darn over open holes, it's just not as easy.


Put the lightbulb inside the sock, and stretch the thin spot over it. Inspect it well to determine where the edges of the thin spot are, so you can gauge how large you need to work your darned patch. I like to work in rectangular patches, allowing at least 1/4" of firm fabric around the edge of the thin spot or hole.


Thread up your needle with about a double arm's-length of yarn, and begin laying lines of yarn across the area you want to patch. I use the lines created by the knit stitches of the sock, and any stripes that may be present, to guide where I take my stitches. You can't see it in the photo, but I am holding the tail of the yarn with my thumb to keep it from pulling through.


Continue to lay lines across the area that needs mending, keeping the fabric of the sock stretched across the surface of the lightbulb the whole time. These are your warp threads. End your warp stitching at the corner diagonally opposite to where you started.


Now you will begin the weft stitching. You'll put your needle over the first warp thread, stitch under the next, over the next, and so on, all the way across your warp stitches.


When you reach the end, turn your work around (remember to stretch your sock to give you a taut, even working surface!) and travel back the other direction, going over the threads you went under, and under the threads you went over. It's just like weaving a basket, only you're using a needle. Again, try to use the lines of the knit stitches and stripes to keep your lines of weaving evenly spaced.


Keep working in this manner until your warp is all filled in with weft stitches.


Your last weft pass should end right next to where you started.


Cut your yarn, leaving a few inches of tail, and tie the two yarn ends together in a square knot.


Poke your needle through the sock, very close to the knot. Thread a yarn end in, and pull it through. Repeat for the other yarn end on the other side of the knot, then open up the sock to pull the yarn ends to the inside.

It takes a bit of practice to get comfortable with your grip, and laying relatively straight lines, but it gets easier with time.



Sometimes you'll let your socks get REALLY worn out, so that the thin spot is too big to stretch the whole thing across your lightbulb. In this case, you'll work your darning in smaller patches, weaving each successive patch into the edge of the patch or patches adjoining. The sock above was repaired with SEVEN separate but interlaced patches!

So there you are. Go fix your socks.

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