Founder
"The infant stage is when knitting starts feeling like knitting again. You have some sleep. You can follow a pattern. You can think about sizing and season and what they'll actually wear. Start with a solid-color raglan to get your gauge back and your rhythm back — nothing complicated, just the satisfaction of making a real garment. Then cast on their first Christmas stocking. It will be hanging on the mantel every December for the rest of their childhood, and eventually their adult life. There is almost no better use of your knitting time."
Simple. Classic. Actually worn.
Photo coming soon
Good Old Raglan
Twisted Knitwear · Free on Ravelry ↗ · Also available: Junior version with button placket
This is the pattern you come back to. Top-down raglan, knit in the round, no seams, and sized from newborn all the way to 14 years — meaning the pattern you learn right now will serve you for the next decade of their wardrobe. The construction is classic and logical: cast on at the neck, work the yoke with raglan increases, separate the sleeves, finish the body, return for the sleeves. If you've knit a raglan before, this will feel like coming home. If you haven't, this is the one to start with.
The key sizing decision for this stage is thinking ahead. Don't knit the size they are right now — knit the size they'll be when the weather turns. A baby born in spring needs a 6-month sweater for fall, not a newborn one. A late summer baby might need 9-month sizing to hit that first chilly stretch. Think about when it will actually be worn and size accordingly.
Start with a solid color or a yarn with subtle variation — heather, tweed, or a tonal — if anything more complex feels like too much right now. Your brain is coming back. Give it an easy win first. You can do stripes or colorwork on the next one.
There's a Good Old Raglan Junior version with a button placket along the front for easier dressing — great once they're squirming. Same pattern family, same sizing. Worth bookmarking for when they're a few months older.
Knit the stocking. Hang it every year.
Photo coming soon
Poinsettia Stocking
KnitPicks · $4.99 at KnitPicks ↗ · Brava Worsted · Intermediate
This is one of the best stocking patterns available — and the reason comes down to the yarn. Brava Worsted doesn't split. That sounds like a small thing until you're working six-color stranded colorwork at worsted weight and you realize how much easier life is when the yarn just does what you tell it to. The colorwork repeat is charted and repeats cleanly across the main body of the stocking, which means once you've memorized the first repeat, the rest flows.
The pattern uses six colors — a large white or cream base and up to five contrast colors for the colorwork sections. The trick that makes this manageable: weigh your contrast yarn with a kitchen gram scale before you start. Pre-wind your color balls to the approximate yardage you'll need per color. That way you're mostly working with one large base ball and small, easy-to-manage color balls alongside it. No tangling, no guessing.
At 14.5" circumference and 19.25" long, it's a full-size stocking — not a decorative token. It will hold candy canes and clementines and wrapped chocolate. It will hang on the mantel at their first Christmas, their fifth, their eighteenth, and eventually their own children's first.
Pre-weigh your contrast yarn with a gram scale and wind small balls to match. You'll mostly be working from one big ball of white with little color balls alongside. This is what makes the colorwork feel manageable instead of chaotic. Don't skip this step.
This is not a last-minute project. Give yourself 6–8 weeks minimum. Cast on in October at the latest — earlier if you're new to colorwork. The stocking that hangs on the mantel at baby's first Christmas is one you started in the infant stage, not the week of.
More infant patterns coming soon — get the free guide to be notified when new kits are added.