Ruffles Baby Sweater – Knitting Pattern & Tutorial

Also available in: Español

Hello Makers, just take a stroll through the stores to see that ruffles are the latest trend. Ruffles, ruffles and more ruffles! Therefore, my proposal today is to incorporate knitted ruffles to a knitted sweater, you will get a unique Ruffles Baby Sweater that won’t go under noticed. Let’s begin!

Materials to make the Ruffles Baby Sweater

On this occasion, the materials we will need to make a  9-12 months size are:

• 3 balls of 50 grams of cotton yarn for 3 mm needles. The yarn that you see on this tutorial is Drops Baby Alpaca Silk in color  1760 light grey purple.
• 3 mm needles
• 4 stitch markers
• 3 stitch holders
• A tapestry needle

Stitches & Techniques

• Cast on
• Stockinnete stitch
• Make increases: M1L and M1R
• Knit Front & Back: Knit in the Front and Back of a Stitch
• Pick up stitches
• Bind off  

How to make a Ruffles Baby Sweater

1. Knit the yoke of the baby sweater

Our ruffles baby sweater is knitted started at the neck area and we knit from the top down until we complete it. First, we will cast on 78 stitches and knit 7 rows in stockinette stitch. You will notice how the fabric is rolled up on itself, do not worry, this is the effect we are looking for this knitted sweater. Once these first 7 rows have been knitted, we will have to separate the stitches for what will later be sleeves, back and front. Thus, in the next row you will have to knit in the following way:

• 13 stitches for the back and place marker
• 2 stitches as guide
• 9 stitches for the sleeve and place marker
• 2 stitches as guide
• 26 stitches for the front and place marker
• 2 stitches as guide
• 9 stitches for the other sleeve and place marker
• 2 stitches as guide
• 13 stitches for the back

Knit the next row following the pattern for the wrong side and from now on all the right side rows will have the increases. You can make the increases in the way that it is most comfortable for you. I chose the M1L and M1R method so that there are no holes in the fabric, but if you find it easier, you can do them as described in this post.

It is very important that each time you reach a marker you remove it, make an increase, put the marker back, knit the guide stitches, and make another increase. In this way, you know where the increases are supposed to be.

Continue knitting in this way until you get 34 stitches in each part of the back, 51 stitches for each sleeve and 68 stitches for the front. Remember that when I count these stitches I am not including the guide stitches.

2. Place on hold the stitches for the back, front and a sleeve

It is time to start putting the back, front and sleeves stitches on hold to knit our ruffles baby sweater in pieces.

• Knit 35 stitches, equivalent to the 34 of the back + 1 guide stitch and put them on hold
• Knit 53 stitches, equivalent to the 51 stitches of the sleeve + 1 guide stitch of one side + 1 guide stitch of the other side. These stitches are left on your working needle because these will be the stitches you will be working with once you have made all the division of stitches.
• Without knitting them, place 70 stitches (69 stitches for the front + 1 guide stitch of one side + 1 guide stitch of the other side) on a stitch holder.
• Without knitting them,  place 53 stitches (51 stitches for the front + 1 guide stitch of one side + 1 guide stitch of the other side) on a stitch holder.

 

3. Knit the sleeves of our ruffles baby sweater

Once all the parts of the ruffles knitted sweater have been separated, continue to knit the sleeves. For the sleeve to narrow as we approach the wrist, we must make a decrease on each side every 10 rows. The easiest way to do it is to count 9 rows, and in the tenth, knit two stitches together,  knit the whole row until you have two stitches left that you will knit together too. Knit this way until you have a total of 39 stitches. Cast off all of the stitches. Once a sleeve is knitted, put the other sleeve stitches on the working needle and knit it following the same instructions.

 4. Knit the back and the front of the knitted baby sweater

Return the reserved stiches for the back (in my case I kept them in the circular needles) and knit them increasing 1 stitch on each side every 10 rows to give the flared shape to the knitted sweater. Once you have increased to 82 stitches, cast off all the stitches and  knit the front the same way.

5. Knit the ruffles on the sleeves

And here comes the fun part if this baby sweater pattern and the one you were probably waiting for! The ruffles! First of all, you must pick up 9 stitches for the first ruffle just where we started making the increases. As you can see in the image, to pick up these stitches, simply insert the needle on one side of each of the ‘” v” stitches. To make the first ruffle, in the next row you must get 4 stitches from one stitch, so that it takes more volume. As in everything, there are several methods to make these increases, the one I like the most and I have used here is the same one that it is used to make the popcorn stitch and that you can learn by watching this tutorial. Once you have increased the 4 stitches from each stitch, you will have a total of 36 stitches. Knit these 36 stitches for 13 rows making an increase on each side on the right side of the rows. For the second and third ruffle, instead of increasing 4 stitches from each stitch, increase 2 stitches from each stitch using the same technique. As you can see in the images, I have picked up 24 stitches for the second ruffle, but do not worry if when you pick up the stiches you get one more stitch or less stitch, this means that have picked up the stitches from a row up or down, but the result will be the same. Regardless of the stitches that you get, you must increase to get double the stitches, that is, in my case I picked up 24 stitches, the first row I must increase to get 48 stitches. Knit these ruffles in the same way that we knit the first one, increasing on each side in the right ride or odd rows. Do not worry if your ruffles do not look like some photographs show, once blocked they will be more even and smooth. There may techniques to block knitted garments, I personally like to use the iron at low temperature and with a lot of steam.

 6. Put the finishing touches

To finish, you only need to add the finishing touches to you knitted ruffles baby sweater. With the help of the tapestry needle, sew the ruffles to the raglan and the sides of the sweater. And to knot it on the back, I chose to knit two cords with the icord technique (you can learn this by watching this video) and sew them on both sides. Another option that I love is sewing two satin ribbons in the same tone as the sweater, for an even more feminine effect. Surely seeing the images of finished garment, you were convinced that it was a complicated project, but it is much easier than it seems! You must start from a basic raglan sleeve knit sweater, of which we have done so many times in the blog (we did the same in this knitted onesie and this Sailor Baby Romper and this baby cardigan, for example) and add the ruffles in the simplest way possible and you are ready to impress! If you like this tutorial and it has been useful to you, comment below and share it,  it is a free! And of course, once you have your finished your Ruffles Baby Sweater, don’t forget to showcase your work on social media using the hashtag #rufflesbabysweater #creativaatelier Kisses!                            

Tutorial, pattern and images registered under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0  . Jersey de Punto con Volantes para bebé – Tutorial y Patrón – -CC by-nc-nd 4.0 -Marta Porcel This pattern is for personal use only. Please do not claim this pattern as your own, or sell or distribute it. If you would like to share this pattern, please link to this site and do not repost the pattern on your site. You can sell finished items made from this pattern, but please link back and give credit to Creativa Atelier. Please, respect designers and their Intellectual Property. Thanks!