A woman starts to knit some jackets (7)
I believe the answer is:
anoraks
'jackets' is the definition.
(anorak is a kind of jacket)
'a woman starts to knit some' is the wordplay.
'woman' becomes 'nora' (**).
'starts to' says to take the initial letters.
The first letters of 'knit some' is 'ks'.
'a'+'nora'+'ks'='ANORAKS'
(Other definitions for anoraks that I've seen before include "protection" , "Hooded waterproof jackets" .)