Warm fingerless mitts from old woollen jumpers

I blogged earlier about making nappy covers from felted woollen jumpers, and using leftovers to make mittens for babies. Here is a way to use the arms from the jumpers to make the warmest fingerless mitts out!

1. Take the jumper sleeves and cut them to the length you want. Pin them to the narrowness you want around your wrists.








Now stitch or overlock this seam.

2. Cut a hole in the stitching along the seam, right up near the cuff of the sleeve (this is for your thumb to poke out, so measure where you would like the finger part of the mitt to come to)








If the wool is properly felted (see earlier blog) you don't need to hem it as it won't fray.
Your finished mitts!

Make mittens from leftover felted wool

I blogged earlier about how to felt wool jumpers to make pull up nappy covers.
You'll probably have lots of little bits left over, but never throw out! You can make heaps of other stuff with this lovely felt.
I know it's getting hot now, but don't you have friends in the Northern hemisphere whose children you're dying to make something for at Christmas? You can make really cute little mittens, so easily. As long as you can do blanket stitch (see here)


First, cut around the shape of a child's hand (or an adult's, if you have big enough pieces of felt). Sew them on the right sides with blanket stitch and they'll look really cute. I made two pairs in about half an hour. I'm planning to make some larger ones, using the jumper's wrist bands as the mittens' wrists.

Sewing your felted wool pull-up cover

This is to continue the last post on making a felted wool pull-up nappy cover.
Last time we talked about felting an old jumper.
For the next step, it's great to use an old pair of PVC pull ups or something else that fits your baby. Either cut out around it, making it a bit bigger to make allowance for the seams, or if it is a really yucky non-breathable plasticky thing, just unpick the seams and spread it out to make it easier to cut around. Finally a good use for those plastic things.

I used an acrylic wool one and cut in the general shape, making it a bit larger in the process.

If you don't have something you can use, there are a couple of online free patterns for training pants which you could probably use. A good one is here
However, note that this pattern has a seam at the crotch (how uncomfortable would that be!) so when you cut out the paper pattern, join this seam together and keep your wool seamless.

Now, take your cut out woolen piece and sew side seams together. Sew wide-ish hems at legs and waist, to insert pants elastic.

I make mine loose so they fit over massive night-time nappies with added boosters.

Make channels for the elastic, around the waist and around the legholes, sewing by hand if the fabric is too thick for the machine. Thread elastic through.

You're pretty much done, but since you've come this far, why not make a nice cut-out in wool felt (a sheep or something) and applique it on the bottom? :)

I'm going to do that when I finish editing and get a bit of time.

Felting wool for pull-up covers

I'm going to blog the details for sewing the cover next time, but for now, how to prepare the wool for sewing.

Take an old woollen jumper and throw it in the washing machine with a towel or something else you can wash on a hot wash. Do several jumpers at once to save energy. You need a small amount of wool wash in there too. Do a hot wash with a cold rinse, and you should find the jumpers come out pretty well perfectly felted. You can cut right into that felt and it won't fray.

A good source for old jumpers (apart from your father's wardrobe) is your local op shop. After all, you only need a piece of wool - the fashionableness of the item is not your concern. So you can often pick up a bargain that no one else wants and that would otherwise languish on the shelves (making you feel like a recycling genius). Jumpers with frayed sleeves, moth-eaten holes and stains can likewise be utilised. The only prerequisite for your jumpers is that they have a high percentage of natural wool (100% is not necessary) . That will ensure a good felting. Jumpers with designs and cables are fine too.

Other items you should gather are pants elastic for legs and waist, and polyester thread for the sewing. Cotton thread will absorb the urine and cause leakage. An ordinary needle is fine on the sewing machine - it will be thicker than most fabrics, especially if there were cables on the jumper, but with care you can manage it.

OK - leave your jumper to dry in the shade and take a rest. Next time we'll look at cutting out and sewing.

Recycling an old wool jumper into a nappy cover

Making your own breathable nappy covers is really so easy. I wrote in the book that wool covers are the best for night-time use if you are using cloth nappies. They keep baby warm and dry even when there is a lot of wee. And they don't need much washing at all, as the lanolin is a self-cleaning property in the wool. But wool covers are impossibly expensive (worth it, of course, but you can't always buy even what is really worth it, right?) I really wanted some more woollen covers for Torsten to use at night, so I tried what seemed to be a really good idea - felting old jumpers and sewing them into covers. This method is tried-and-true - see a good exposition of it here However, the problem I found was that the jumpers tended to shrink too much for making a toddler-sized cover. Perfect if you're making for a newborn, of course. The other thing is that sewing the cover right up the front, as this method suggests, means you have seams right where baby wees. And seams are where wee can sometimes leak. Aaaaanyway... I found a way out. Enter felted wool pull-ups! I'm going to blog next on preparing felted wool to do this.