Learning Experience (or Not)

The other day I was knitting away on my handspun socks.

They had a heel and I was working up the leg and enjoying the feel of knitting with handspun (as one does) and I noticed something. I noticed that the foot looked long. It looked too long really, I started to get a sinking feeling. I look at it, I held it up to my foot. I looked at it some more. I thought about the gauge I had checked and the math I had done to check on when to start the gusset increases. I decided to try it out. I pulled the needles out and pulled the sock on my foot. There was over an inch of sock flapping at my toes. Way too big.
I really don't know what happened. I measured gauge in a couple of places (partly because it's handspun and might be a little different here and there) I figured out how many increases I would need to do and how many rounds that would take. I added in a bit for the actual heel turn and away I went. I did actual math. They still didn't work.
To me, that's part of the trouble with toe-up socks. You don't know that it isn't right until the heel is actually done. At that point it's so demoralizing to have to rip back. I decided these needed a good, long time out. So then, this happened.

Yup, ripped out entirely. I'll reskein the yarn and wash it and then maybe I'll think about winding it and casting on again but maybe top-down this time. No sense getting all crazy again.
I also heard the other day that it's six months to Christmas. That caused me to do this (after ripping the handspun sock).

I'm not too sure who these will go to yet. I was thinking my stepdad but now I'm not sure. Is this too, uh, girlie? Time will tell. Please note: I obviously didn't learn from being frustrated with the other toe-up socks. These are toe-up too.