CO - Bettie

I casted on a new knee sock. This time it's Bettie lace stocking by Hana Jason. The pattern is in the spring issue of interweave knits. The first time I saw it I knew I had to make it. I'm glad I didn't start right away because now I can profit from the experience of other knitters with this patten. Obviously the calf shaping is not enough to fit a nice curvy leg. I saw alot of projects where the calf shaping needed to be done with going up in more than one needle size and still is a bit too tight around the calf. Even though the pattern includes two different patterns for the major lace motif but it's just not enough. I read through the pattern and the total calf shaping is made with increasing 6 stitches per leg, which isn't enough for me - with my last stocking I increased 24 sts to fit my calf!
So I'm making quite a few changes to the pattern. First I go down in needle size to work with my normal tension, that means I use 2.25mm needles. Also I will make 4 repeats of the main lace instead of 3. And instead of using the "shaping" of the original pattern I will try to find a better way to increase. Last but not least I don't like the laddering bordering lace motif which I'm going to replace with a simple cable. Writing this down it seams like I change alot more than what it sounded like in my head.

p.s. reading through my older posts I saw I already crocheted Betties =^__^=