If you want to practice wool crafts, knitting, and crocheting with your children, but you find that they don’t have the patience or dexterity to finish a project, then finger knitting may be for you!
A few years ago, I facilitated a knitting and crocheting class. A few of the women who came were not keen at all on the idea of knitting. It takes too long, they said. I heartily agreed.
In the corner, my daughter was playing around with some yarn. She was trying to finger knit. One of the women asked what she was doing, so I showed her how to finger knit a simple scarf. She was hooked. She knitted an entire scarf in that one-hour session. That same year, I finger knitted scarves for my daughter’s birthday party guests, all in 30 minute increments while waiting in her dance class. Needless to say, finger knitting is really quick and simple.
If you’d like to try finger knitting with your kids or just for yourself, here’s how to give it a try.
Get some fluffy yarn. I like fun fur, but you can use any chunky yarn that is easy to work with. If you’re doing this as a project with children, stay away from fun fur at first, since it’s somewhat difficult to work with.
Tie a loop of yarn at the end of the piece of yarn. Loop it around your thumb. Weave the yarn around your fingers in loops. Look it around the index finger, the middle finger, and ring finger, and the pinky finger.
Each finger should now have some yarn on the front. Make sure that the yarn is loose and sitting
at the base of the fingers. Go back across the hand and create another loop above the first one.
Starting at the thumb, move the bottom loop over the top of the thumb and place it behind the thumb. Do the same with each of the bottom loops. You have made your first row!
Now, starting at the side where you ended – the pinky finger – create another loop of yarn above the loop that is on your fingers. Go all the way across your hand, making loops on each finger. Repeat the process above. Starting with your thumb, move the bottom loop over the top loop to the back of your hand.
You’ve now made a second row.
Keep up the process above until you’ve made a long scarf that drapes over the back of your hand. Weave the loose end of yarn through the loops as you bring them off your hand, and tie them together.
You’ve now made a scarf without any sort of knitting needles at all!
Image Credit: Oddball 27