How to Make a Simple Wool Sweater for Your Toddler

I am so excited to share this sweater because it was the inspiration behind the whole blog! This was my first time crocheting a sweater and wanted to share my process and the modifications I made to the original pattern. I actually started this sweater for Lyon, but I quickly realized it was going to turn out bigger than I planned so I pivoted and made it for Salomon instead. It worked out because it came out to be around a 3-4T size and fits him with room to grow.

Background

I taught myself how to crochet back in 2022 when I was pregnant with Salomon. I started by reading a beginners crochet book which I will link here and doing swatches of basic stitches. I then jumped into making my first baby blanket which turned out a little wonky to say the least. Stitch counting is VERY important and no, you cannot just tack on stitches at the end of a row if you are off, lesson learned. I then made a little baby cocoon which turned out great, some hats, and finally a large baby blanket that turned out great.

With all of this experience, I felt confident going into this sweater even though I hadn’t done one before. If you can read a pattern, you can make pretty much anything in my opinion. One thing I always forget when it’s been a while is to hold less tension than I think I need so that the stitches are easier to work into. However, crocheting is like riding a bike and by the end of it I was fully grooving.

The most challenging part of this process was making the modifications to account for the yarn I chose. I wanted to make this sweater 100% wool, and the gauge of this yarn was different than the one used in the pattern.

Materials

I spent a little while trying to figure out what wool yarn to use. Ultimately I settled on this variety pack from Amazon which inspired my idea to make a striped pattern. If you want to make this exact sweater, however, I’d recommend ordering the individual skeins directly from knit picks. This is not a superwash wool which is why I chose it. It is a little hairy, so beware of that. My toddler is very particular, and he isn’t bothered by it, but if you want a softer option you can use merino wool.

Wool of the Andes Worsted Weight (in order)

1 skein Dove Heather
2 skeins White
1 skein Mink Heather
1 skein Marble Heather
1 skein Pumice Heather
1 skein Briar Heather
1 skein Bittersweet Heather

Why Wool?

I recently fell in love with wool after buying wool cloth diaper covers. It’s breathable, temperature regulating, antibacterial, and resistant to dirt and moisture. This makes it a perfect choice for baby and toddler clothing. It is hand wash only (unless you choose a super wash variety) but it’s easy to spot clean and you really don’t need to wash it very often.

Pattern

I used the Simple Stripe Pullover Pattern by Daisy Farm Crafts for the basic construction of this sweater. They have so many great designs available for free and I will definitely be using more for them in the future.

Because I bought a multipack of yarn, I was inspired by the striped version of this sweater linked here. The pattern she made was 2 rows of base color, 4 rows of an accent color. Because I was adding more rows to account for the difference in yarn, I did 2 rows of the base (white) and 6 rows of each accent color.

I used a different color for the collar and band than for the sleeve cuffs because I ran out of the grey, but I didn’t mind making that adjustment. I think all of the colors look cohesive together and I love how it turned out! The inly thing I kind of regret is not doing 2 rows of white between the body and the band at the bottom, but I would have needed to factor those rows into the total length.

Modifications

Collar

Because the gauge for this sweater is in hdc and not sl st, I had to modify the collar size by measurement. A different post on their website had suggested that a good rule of thumb is to measure the head circumference of your baby and subtract 2.5 inches to get a collar size. Lyon’s head circumference is 18” so I was aiming for a 15” collar. I ended with 112 stitches.

I’ll admit, I messed up here. I must have been really tired when I was making this because I didn’t even realize until now that I made the collar 18.5”. No wonder it ended up so big. It’s even a bit of a boatneck on Salomon and an oversized shape, but I think it is a very cute style.

Body

For the rest of the sweater I followed the pattern exactly, switching colors between rows as needed. When I did my gauge swatch I determined I was going to need more rows compared to the pattern. I calculated the number of rows I was going to need and then divided by the colors and came up with the alternating 2 and 6 row pattern. I ended with 36 rows.

Increasing rounds for the bodice was the hardest part of the whole process for me. I don’t know how many times I had to undo multiple rounds and start over to get the stitch counts right. It can be tricky to tell what stitches to work into when there are chains involved. Something I eventually found is that the stitch belongs to the post that comes after it. It is explained in the video that accompanies this pattern here at 13:55(timestamp).

Band

Another mistake I didn’t realize I made until I was done is that I worked the rib stitch into every row along the bottom instead of every other row. The amount of time and yarn this would have saved me. Doing the rib stitch all the way around took a very long time and was a bit tedious. It was a journey, but by the time I was done I actually kind of liked doing it. If I had followed the pattern and done half as many rib stitches it would have drawn in at the bottom. I don’t mind that it is straight though, it’s just a slightly different style.

Sleeves

The sleeves were very straight forward and I followed the same pattern as the body so all of the stripes line up. The only thing I wish I had done differently here is make the sleeve cuffs longer. Because this pattern was intended for smaller sizes the cuffs are pretty short. You can easily modify this by adding more chains.

Summary

Here is what I learned:

Use your child’s head circumference minus 2.5” as the collar size
Do a gauge swatch to determine how many rows you will need compared to the pattern
Use a sweater that fits your child to measure for reference (or a size chart)
When increasing rounds, work into the stitch before the post

I hope that you enjoyed reading about how I converted this pattern into a wool sweater for my son! I had so much fun seeing this come together. He was reluctant to try it on, as toddlers are, but then he refused to take it off for two full days. I have already started on my next sweater for Lyon and my gears have been turning with all kinds of ideas for future projects so stay tuned!