Superwash merino wool is lovely and soft, and very absorptive (ideal for drooly babies!).
My son Max is now 6 months old and has outgrown the large crop of first-size baby sweaters that I knit in anticipation of his birth. This is sad, but it also gives me a practical reason to knit some more little sweaters, and they hardly take any time!
Packing away a pile of tiny baby sweaters…
The Flax Sweater from Tin Can Knits Simple Collection is an extremely versatile pattern, sized from newborn all the way to adult 4XL. The design gauge is 18 sts / 4”, but when I knit it in Rainbow Heirloom Sweater, I went for a gauge of 20 sts / 4” instead. The colourway I used is ‘jewel sea’ a deep bold teal.
How to adjust for a different gauge
I chose the 1-2 year size, and took a look at the stitch count at the body, which is 92 stitches. At 4.5 sts / inch, this yields a finished chest size of 20.5” (92 / 4.5). At my gauge of 5 sts / inch, it would yield a finished garment measurement of about 18.5”. I thought that was a little bit skinny, so I decided to just cast on a couple extra stitches at each underarm, so my final body stitch count would be 96 sts (for a finished body measurement of 19.25”).
He’s trying so hard to learn to crawl! Rainbow Heirloom Sweater in ‘jewel sea’
That’s how I decided to knit the 1-2 yr size, which ended up coming out about the size of the 6-12 month size, perfect for my little man! I knit the sleeves and the body nice and long, and I bet this sweater will fit him for the next year. The neckline was just fine, because the sweater is pretty much proportional all over, simply knit at a slightly smaller gauge.
Gotta love a little frowny-faced baby!
Here are a couple other versions of Flax that I knit for Max when he was a little bit smaller…
A teeny-tiny newborn size Flax in Rainbow Heirloom Twinkle Light in ‘fluffy bunny’. It fit for about 4 weeks!
Rainbow Heirloom Sweater in ‘young temptress’ and ‘black cherry’.
At Tin Can Knits, 2015 is the Year Of The Sweater… so Alexa and I set a goal to knit a sweater a month for the whole year! If you want to join us, we will be sharing our progress on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Ravelry… join in by tagging your posts with #TCK12sweaters2015
Rainbow Heirloom 
What an adorable little thing you’ve created! And the sweaters are fun, also. Amazing how fast these babies grow, isn’t it? You’re a terrific Mother to keep your son in soft, cuddly sweaters.