How to Alter Knit Leg Warmers for Older Kids

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Help! My daughter outgrew her hand knit leg warmers! Today I’m sharing a simple and quick way to alter knit leg warmers with the Cherry Blossom Leg Warmers to fit your growing girl.

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Keep scrolling to read how I altered the Cherry Blossom Leg Warmers to fit my 7 year old. You can purchase the pattern here in my shop or over on Ravelry and Etsy.

Don’t have big kids yet? Read all about what to actually knit for babies from a mom of four here.

Can I alter a knitting pattern as my kids grow?

Yes! It’s a lot easier than it seems, especially for something like leg warmers. You can easily learn how to alter knit leg warmers and get use from the pattern for years!

The original Cherry Blossom Leg Warmers were written when my girls were a baby and a toddler. But they eventually outgrew them, and sadly were passed down as hand me downs to their sister.

Recently, though, these leg warmers have seen a resurgence in playing dress up.

They’ve still worked as leg warmers (although, very short). But the knit leg warmers have also been seen as wrist warmers for princesses in their play.

These leg warmers take just a bit of yarn and barely any time (think a cabin sock, without the heel or foot!).

And so, I realized it’s high time that I knit some updated pairs for all three of my girls.

If you haven’t yet, head here to grab the Cherry Blossom Leg Warmer pattern. You can also use any leg warmer pattern and follow these few steps to alter it.

>>Check out my cabin sock knitting patterns here!

What yarn did I use to alter knit leg warmers?

This is the yarn that I use most often for leg warmers.

This wool worsted weight yarn is my favorite because it’s actually warm! Especially when my girls pair their leg warmers with swimsuits in January or leotards in March.

Bonus: I absolutely love buying from Knit Picks/We Crochet (they have easy returns and amazing customer service). They rarely run out of a color for long, and the wool is really soft.

You can find my other favorite worsted weight yarn choices in this blog post.

How to alter knit leg warmers for an older girl

1. The first thing is to measure your daughter’s leg at the widest part of her calf. You’ll also measure the length you’ll want the leg warmer, but this is something you can figure out after casting on, too.
2. Take the largest size of leg warmer listed in the pattern (2-4T) and you’re going to alter that size.
3. Do some quick math using the gauge listed in the pattern (24 sts /20 rows =4” in k1, p1 ribbing) for the calf measurement you got. Make sure you cast on an even number because of the k1p1 ribbing.
4. Grab a pencil or make an Excel sheet. You want to draw out the knit and purl stitches and the cable panels. When you add stitches, you’ll want to try to add a couple of knit or purl stitches next to each other because they tuck into the pattern and will be less noticeable. If you need to add a lot of stitches (5 or more), then you’ll want to add a 4 stitch cable panel instead of a bunch of extra stitches that will spread out and change the look of the whole leg warmer.
5. Test it! Cast on the number of stitches you calculated, and test the cable panel. No need to do an inch of ribbing (as long as you cast on an even number, this will turn out fine). We’re interested in testing how the cables look, so you don’t need to waste time on the ribbing!
6. Adjust the stitches on your paper or Excel sheet if you think it needs changes (you’d rather just one purl stitch between a cable panel because it looks better than doing 5 extra knits and purls).

How I altered toddler leg warmers for my seven year old

I cast on 32 stitches for my 7 year old peanut. It’s an even number and based on the gauge I knew these would fit her better than casting on 30 like I did when she was a 4 year old.

Here’s what the cable row looked like with 32 stitches:

P1, k4, p1, k1, p1, k4, p1, k1, p1, k4, p1, k1, p1, k4, p1, k4, p1.

As you can see, there’s going to be a smaller gap between the last cable and the first cable. I only have one purl stitch, instead of the regular p1, k1, p1.

When I sketched it out and tested it, it looked better to have another cable twist in the row instead of spreading out the other cables. I don’t think it looks squished, but you might totally think the opposite in your testing and that’s okay!

Then I knit 10 rows of ribbing on each end.

She is tall, so I extended the cable panel by one row. That means instead of cabling every 7^th row, I did a cable repeat every 8^th row. I thought this elongated cable looked better for a longer leg warmer.

I knit a total of 6 elongated cables to make the whole leg warmer longer.

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And that’s it!

The same baby and toddler leg warmers, handmade to fit a 7 year old!

Will they be used as wrist warmers and Barbie sleeping bags as well? Oh, definitely. But now she has a pair to dance in with her sisters and wear over leggings to playdates that actually do fit.

I hope this helps you alter a baby or toddler knit leg warmer pattern as your daughter grows!

Happy knitting!