Knit Jamies Tutorial

Knit Jammies Tutorial

Turn these:

Into these:

1. Picking out your sweater

This step can make these easy or hard to make depending on what type of sweater you pick out. For example, the perfect sweater for a baby would be something like this:

It has a simple small neck and buttons all the way down it.

The pink sweater below, because the neck is a little large and harder to tamper with is better for a larger size. Mine is on a 3 year old. 

So just keep necks in mind when buying a sweater. After I had made the sweaters in the post for my younger two, my oldest was feeling left out so I went and found a super long sweater for her. This is what I am going to use in my tutorial. 

 

Totally ugly sweater but it is long enough for a 5 year old to wear.

2. Lay out your sweater flat and grab a pair of P.J.'s

3. Lay P.J.'s on top of the sweater

When you are laying your legs down the front of the sweater you want one leg to run straight down the buttons because this will be the opening and closing of the jammies. It will make the jammies look a little off center but they will look just fine once they are on. 

See, looks a little off in the legs.

But looks totally fine once they are one.

Also, make sure the jammies lay flat right up to the neck. We don't want to touch the neck if there is a collar on the sweater. (Now, if there is no collar and you need to make the neck smaller, like I did in the striped jammies, then go for it. But all the other jammies I have made I haven't needed to mess with the neck)

4. Cut around jammies. Remember to leave a seam allowance.

Notice that I didn't cut the arms out. Fold the arms in so that you are cutting the full outline of the jammies sans arms. And this is where the neck comes in. KEEP THE NECK UNTOUCHED. Just cut straight up to the shoulder area. The beauty of this project is that there are no finishing seams to do. They have already been made for us.

5. Cut out arms

Lay your pajama arms flat on the sweater arm matching the cuffs together.

Cut around. Remember to leave a seam allowance.

6. Pin arms to body, right sides together.

7. Sew

Start with the cuffs together and sew along arm and down to the leg. Repeat on other side. Then sew from inside leg to the other inside leg. If you are making foot pajamas(like the striped pj's below), then just sew one continuous seam from cuff to cuff.

Note: I used a serger to sew all these up and then I used my sewing machine to reinforce all the stitches since these are knit and like to fray after they have been cut into. If you don't have a serger then just use a zigzag stitch. Also, I recommend sewing these up right after you cut them for minimal fraying. 

8. The neck and/or leg

So this is where I feel like my tutorial is a "choose your own adventure" book. 

Each jammie was a little different in the neck. The white sweater was super small, too small for me which is why I changed it into jammies. And I didn't have to make the neck any smaller. On the striped jammies, I talked about making it smaller when cutting into it to fit better in step 3. The pink jammies were made into a larger size just so I didn't have to mess with the neck. It was a tad low on my 3 year old but worked. Now, onto the black jammies I am using for the tutorial. There is a rather large opening on these. Since I didn't want to cut into the neckline at all, I just added buttons and button holes hidden under neath the collar. Sneaky and it did the trick to hold it all together and closed. 

Also, with all the legs except the black jamies, the buttons went all the way to the bottom so I didn't have to do anything. But if you look in the picture under step 3 you will notice that the buttons don't go all the way down. So I just sewed the opening closed until I reached the buttons. (this is another reason to make sure you really look at what you buy. You will have less steps this way)

9. Decorate

 

The buttons on some of the sweaters were super nasty or super cool. 

Cool Buttons:

I hated the ones on the striped sweater so I switched them out. But I left the cute pocket on the striped sweater.  I also put on new buttons on the white sweater to add color.

10. Extra fabric

What do you do with the extra fabric? Makes hats, mittens, booties, whatever!

 Or if you find a sweater you like with only one button and don't feel like making more button holes to turn it into jammies then turn it into a layette set. 

This sweater:

 Into these mittens and hat:

For the hat just cut out a square making the bottom of the sweater the bottom of the hat. 

See, excess fabric

 Cut into a square.

Then sew up the square leaving an opening for the head of course. And then pull the 2 top corners together and stitch with a cute pom pom in the middle. 

For the mittens, trace a hand or another mitten to get the size you need, making sure to use a finished side of the sweater the bottom of your mittens. Then stitch up and enjoy!

These really are simple to make, I just had so many different variations, I wanted to make sure I included everything I did for you guys. If you have any questions on the tutorial just leave a comment on my blog and I will try and answer it. If I need to I will also update the tutorial on my blog.