Important Knitting and Crochet Guidelines

We recommend using soft baby weight (sport weight or 3-ply) yarn for baby hats and booties and saving the heavier worsted weight (4-ply) for afghans. The full worsted weight yarn usually makes very stiff and thick hats that simply aren't as useful on the delicate newborn skin for tiny babies.

Please remember to make the cuff on hats stretchy and of course, booties need to have a stretchy cuff to fit around chubby baby ankles. Please try to keep it loose around the bottom edge of hats and not have a tight, inflexible finished edge. A hat MUST stretch to properly fit over a baby's head!

Please make hats 5-6 inches deep. Preemie heads average 12 inches in circumference while newborn heads average 14 inches. Those little ones have big heads for such tiny bodies and they grow fast! A hat that is a little long can usually be folded up to fit. Very pre-mature babies are often not given hats because their skin is too fragile and they are kept warm in incubators.

We love and appreciate every item donated to us and want to make sure your work is able to be used. As always, the pattern box is available at meetings and we usually have some yarn available as well.