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The Craft Train

Crafty ideas for kids and parents

You are here: Home / Crafts and Activities / General Crafts / Finger knitting for kids

Finger knitting for kids

February 12, 2017 By Kate 29 Comments

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Finger knitting is a fabulous and easy craft for kids of all ages (from around the ages of 5 and up, but younger kids may be capable also). It’s a simple stitch, requires no experience or expertise, no equipment other than yarn and scissors and it is much, much quicker and easier than traditional knitting. It’s similar to french knitting with a similar result, but quicker and easier than that too.

You might also like our finger knit snakes

If you’ve never finger knitted before fear not. I had never finger knitted before either until my youngest daughter (who was 6 at the time) showed me how. She had picked it up by watching some older girls at school finger knitting, and then came home and knitted a length that could literally wrap around our whole lounge room twice!

In this post my girls are showing you how they finger knit, with simple step-by-step pictures. Some of the future projects we have planned have finger knitting as one of the steps so I thought it would be useful to have a single post with the basic stitch explained.

You can do finger knitting with just one finger, two, three or four depending on how thick you want your ‘rope’ to be. Today we are explaining two-finger knitting because that’s what my eight year old felt like making at the time.

You Will Need

• Yarn – any thickness will do but I personally love using the bulky kinds (8ply and up)
• Scissors
• Your fingers

How To:

  1. Clamp the end of the yarn between your thumb and the palm of your hand. If you are right handed clamp it in your left hand, and if you are left handed do the opposite.
  2. Create a figure eight with the yarn around your first two fingers.
  3. Create a second figure eight directly above it.
  4. Leaving the second loop in place, lift the bottom loop over the top of it and slip it off the end of your finger, repeat with the second finger.
  5. You can now let go of the end which has been clamped between your thumb and the palm of you hand. Give it a gentle tug.
  6. Repeat the stitch by making another figure eight, lifting the bottom loops over the top loops and slipping them off your fingers.
  7. Continue knitting using this technique.
  8. When you are happy with the length, slip both of the loops off the ends of your fingers and hold them in one hand.
  9. Snip the yarn with your scissors and thread the end of it back through both loops, gently tugging the end of your rope.
  10. You’re all done!

Finger knit using one, three or four fingers by extending the figure eight to include the next two fingers, or reducing it to include only one.

Here is my younger daughter finger knitting with four fingers:

You can see how super simple it is. If you have knitted a length and wish to come back and continue it later a simple trick is to slip the ends over felt tip pens in place of your fingers. Connector pens work brilliantly for this purpose because they snap together and your knitting won’t slip off the ends.

Finger knitting makes a great craft for kids

Now go on, try it yourself.

Free LEGO magazine

More fun craft ideas using yarn:

• Traditional yarn dolls are a simple and inexpensive DIY toy
• Make a woven butterfly using craft sticks and yarn
• Make your own DIY pom pom maker using a scrap of cardboard

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Pin it:

Finger knitting for kids – a step by step guide with easy-to-follow instructions and pictures

 

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Easy ideas for sewing with kids

Comments

  1. 1

    Deebi27 says

    April 14, 2017 at 6:13 am

    Fabulous instructions…thanks girls (& Mom!)

    Reply
  2. 2

    alice says

    July 31, 2017 at 4:37 am

    What do you do with the chains of knitting? Can you join them together? If so how??

    Reply
    • 3

      Kate says

      December 20, 2017 at 6:39 pm

      We haven’t gotten that far, but I’m sure you could use a needle and thread to sew them together

      Reply
      • 4

        javen jordet says

        February 20, 2021 at 11:14 am

        you can finger knit them together with string. it is pretty easy. (javen jordet, 12 years old, anchorage, alaska).

        Reply
        • 5

          Kate says

          February 21, 2021 at 7:14 am

          That sounds pretty cool. Great to hear from you Javen

          Reply
  3. 6

    Holly says

    December 19, 2017 at 1:09 pm

    This is fun and easy. I will teach my daughter how to do this. Now all of stuffed animals and dolls will have scarves for winter and just plain fashion.
    Thanks for sharing.
    Holly

    Reply
    • 7

      Kate says

      December 20, 2017 at 6:40 pm

      No problem! Thanks for reading and taking the time to comment 🙂

      Reply
  4. 8

    Mackenzee Norwood says

    April 1, 2018 at 6:04 pm

    Do you know how to finger crochet?
    If so can you post something about how to do it?
    I love your work you should message me about anything. Just do it on pintrest @ Kenzee Norwood

    Reply
    • 9

      Mackenzee Norwood says

      April 1, 2018 at 6:06 pm

      Sorry I meant Mackenzee Autumn❤❤❤❤

      Reply
    • 10

      Kate says

      April 2, 2018 at 11:55 pm

      Hi Mackenzee, I’ve never finger crocheted before, but it sounds fun!

      Reply
  5. 11

    sara says

    April 14, 2018 at 5:28 am

    it looks awesome and easy to do. Thanks a lot!!

    Reply
    • 12

      Kate says

      April 16, 2018 at 6:43 am

      It’s SO easy. Have fun!

      Reply
  6. 13

    Jennifer Potter says

    August 19, 2018 at 4:27 am

    How do you add another row?

    Reply
    • 14

      Kate says

      August 20, 2018 at 1:29 am

      You can’t with your fingers (or if you can I don’t know how). If you want to you can sew two rows together, but the finger knitting in general is just a super simple project that’s great for kids. Similar to french knitting.

      Reply
  7. 15

    Terri says

    April 12, 2019 at 9:08 pm

    My extended day kids (school-age) have been finger knitting! We are collecting them to weave them into a rug using a hula hoop and cut pieces of a shirts! We followed another DIY for that, but your instructions here are perfect for my kids with no experience finger knitting! Thank you!

    Reply
    • 16

      Kate says

      April 18, 2019 at 6:53 am

      Awesome! So glad you found our instructions helpful. The hula hoop weaving sounds like a great project idea too.

      Reply
  8. 17

    Haven says

    January 27, 2020 at 10:17 am

    My mom told me that I needed to learn how to knit, but we didn’t have any knitting needles. I found your website and am obsessed with finger knitting.

    Reply
    • 18

      Kate says

      January 29, 2020 at 6:03 am

      I don’t know how to knit with needles either but this is so fun and easy! Thanks for reading.

      Reply
  9. 19

    Joyce Zheng says

    February 10, 2020 at 9:57 am

    I will definitely try this!

    Reply
    • 20

      Kate says

      February 10, 2020 at 10:41 am

      Its so easy and fun – you definitely should try it 🙂

      Reply
  10. 21

    Swati Pandey says

    February 28, 2020 at 5:54 am

    I luv this particular knitting style very muchh. I want to learn this. Thanku alot for teaching the process in a simple way. I will definitely try this out and wear self-made warmer 😍😍

    Reply
    • 22

      Kate says

      February 28, 2020 at 6:45 am

      I’m glad you like it 🙂

      Reply
  11. 23

    Fina says

    April 2, 2020 at 7:14 pm

    While holding the knot in the middle with the thumb and middle finger of the right hand, pull the left hand on the left end of the thread. So the loop closes. The first knot of her cord is finished. – Yes ?

    Reply
    • 24

      Kate says

      April 6, 2020 at 6:37 am

      Yes, make sure the loop is closed and tie a knot

      Reply
  12. 25

    Vanessa says

    April 17, 2020 at 7:28 pm

    Thanks so much for these simple instructions. We have lots of wool and I’ve been wanting to find a simple craft for my 6 year old daughter. She sat down and made a chain for half an hour with ease! Brilliant to find, we are in week 4 of lockdown in our country and this has been a great wee craft!

    Reply
    • 26

      Kate says

      April 18, 2020 at 8:04 am

      That’s lovely to hear. Thanks for using our tutorial, I’m glad you found it helpful 🙂

      Reply
  13. 27

    Melissa says

    August 13, 2020 at 7:46 am

    I followed these instructions to teach it to my daughter and she made me a really long chain. It was VERY loose so, I knitted her chain again and came up with a really thick chain that I sewed together to make a hat! She LOVES it and is SO proud! Thanks for the great instructions!!! I may have my Scouts try to make these too!

    Reply
    • 28

      Kate says

      August 14, 2020 at 1:59 pm

      The hat sounds amazing! I’m glad she had fun 🙂

      Reply
  14. 29

    Sue Rizzo says

    December 31, 2020 at 7:31 am

    Your instructions are so clear. Thank you! I’m going to use this technique with kids at my library. They will love it!

    Reply

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