The Opposite of Lace

I just started a pair of quite masculine socks (that is, fairly plain and in a dark color) for my husband.



They're an enlargement (I had to add two pattern repeats) of the Spey Valley socks from Knitting on the Road. Above and below the knit/purl patterned section they have something Nancy Bush calls vikkel braid. It looks almost exactly like sideways knitted stitches.



Since the rest of the sock is 5/2 ribbing, I thought I might start the second sock now, get through the part that requires some attention and save that endless ribbing for post-baby knitting. I'm a little wary of that option though, since that may well lead to me finding them, unfinished, in a bag four years from now. I do that with projects now, so I can only imagine the state of my knitting in the imminent baby-filled world. Maybe that's why I like blogs of knitters with young children so much recently -- they prove that there is knitting after babies!