It’s Ease-y

Apr 12, 2006

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Monday, Linda asked: “What size extra fine loom did you get? My foot measured 8.5, so I went with the 9?. Not sure I did the right thing, and it will be off in the mail probably tomorrow. Just so confused about sizing and don’t feel I’ve gotten a definite answer on it. Any insight now that you have your EF sock loom?”

This brings up an important issue in knitting your own garments. Ease.. now I am not talking about how easy it is to knit the thing.. what ease refers to is ease of movement..that little bit of extra elbow room you have in your knitted garment so your don’t find yourself writhing on the floor trying to wrangle yourself out of your sweater!

I’ll talk socks here but if you want info on other garments in general I suggest you click on this link for a great explaination of ease..

Go Knit in Your Hat

So back to the question at hand. Socks, and size..

Generally speaking you don’t want baggy loose fitting socks. They will tend to bunch up in your shoes and are unfomfortable. But on the other hand you don’t want them too tight fitting or stretched or it will limit their life span due to the stress on the fibers and your toes will be a lovely shade of blue! (although as Stephanie is quick to point out in her book: socks WILL wear out eventually so sock knitting is the ultimate expression of love)

Ok.. sorry I digress.. Back to Linda’s dilemna.. Now Linda and I both measure at 8.5 inches around the largest part of our foot. I bought an 8 inch sock loom and she originally ordered the 9 inch. I fear that Linda (had she gotten that 9 inch loom) would have found that her socks were a little loose an bunchy. I made a swatch on my 8 inch loom and tried it out and it fits just fine (though I havn’t washed it and it will probably shrink up just a bit.. but I can tell you there is a little room for that) So rest assured that the 8 inch loom should work fine for you Linda!

So in the end if you are looking at these new super extra fine gauge sock looms that Sam has created.. and you are a ‘tweener’ up to 3/4 inches above a given size offered go for the smaller size. So anyone who has a foot that measures 8-8 3/4″ I would say go for the 8 inch loom, or if your foot measures 9-9 3/4″ go for the 9 incher and so on.

In fact ‘experts’ say that you can have negative ease up to an inch in socks and not have much trouble, but I wouldn’t reccomend this as you will want to allow a little ‘ease’ for yarn shrinkage!

I hope this answers Linda’s question.. (I know it a little late!) and I hope this helps as others of you think about what loom to purchace for your projects!

Knitting Without Needles

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2 responses to “It’s Ease-y”

Lisa

04/12/2006

Thanks for posting this, Denise! I just measured my foot today and it’s 8.5″. If I hadn’t read this post first, I probably would have gone with the 9″ loom; now I know to order the 8″. Thanks a bunch for sharing your knowledge!
Linda

04/13/2006

Denise,
I really appreciate this info.
I did end up ordering the 8″ extra fine loom, however, over at Tracey’s blog, she ran into a snag. Her foot measured just slightly over 8.5″, so she went with the 9″ loom, and her sock ended up too tight. She used the flat “U” stitch. So I guess we’ll need a discussion on sizing based on the knitting techniques chosen such as e-wrap v. flat “U” stitch, tension, etc. I should receive my looms in a couple of days, and I’ll try the swatch test using both the e-wrap and the flat stitch.

Denise, FYI, my Italian last name means, “pirate”!

It’s Ease-y

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