**Hey folks, Justin here.  Today marks the beginning of an exciting new feature here at the quilt shop: Budget crafting tips!  Brenda has become quite adept at making things look like you spent a bundle on them when you really didn’t.  Some ingenuity and outside of the box thinking goes a long way.  This will be a regular Tuesday feature!  Please let us know what you think in the comments!  Now on to Brenda’s post…***

Hello everyone,

I have been working so hard on all of my Halloween crafts to sell this year, that I have finally completed them.  I have a huge assortment of Halloween items to purchase.  There is something for everyone.

So I with my Halloween items done for the year I got the chance to catch up on some sewing and crafty items that I needed to do around the house for the family.   Mostly I worked on sewing repairs and alterations for my Kiddies.  Amelia, my 4 year old daughter, wears a Princess dress almost every day.  I have had to re-sew these dresses many times.  This week I am adding a sheer fabric, as a top skirt or ruffle on several of her dresses.   I might take a little time to repair the dresses, but the bright smile on my daughter’s face, makes it all worth it.

Other then clothing repairs this week, I decided to take some of my older and larger sweaters (I have lost a bunch of weight) that are still in almost new condition and alter them for my 10 year old daughter.

I took four sweaters and made her four new items for her wardrobe.  With the first sweater I made a sweater skirt.   I turned the sweater inside out and cut off each of the arms plus 3-4 inches from each side.  I then cut the top of the sweater off so I had a nice straight line across the top.  After sewing the sides up, I made a casing for the elastic and sewed the elastic inside.  I did not have to do any hemming on the skirt, for the bottom of the sweater made it’s own hem.

Keep in mind if you attempt this at home to sew with a good stretch stitch so the thread does not break when the sweater item is worn.  Also use a zigzag stitch in the seam to keep the sweater from fraying.

The second sweater I made a sweater dress for my daughter.  I had white sweater that was long on me, that made a perfect sweater dress for Leatha.   I turned the sweater inside out, and laid it flat.  I then  cut up each side of the sweater so the new dress would be more my daughter’s size Because the neck opening was so large on my daughter I trimmed  2 inches off the top of each shoulder .

I then sewed the top of the dress, the new shoulders, and down each side of the dress leaving the area open to attach the sleeves.  Next I measured my daughters arm and decided that ¾ length sleeves would look best.

I then cut the sweater to that length plus one inch for the seam.   I tapered the sleeves so they fit nicely on my daughter.   The sleeves were then attached.  Again a hem was not needed for the bottom of the original sweater was intact.    With the scraps from the sweater I made a matching belt and added a buckle with her birth stones in it.  As requested from my daughter I sewed 4 white rose buttons on the top of the dress along the neck line.

For my third repurposed sweater I followed the same plan as with the sweater dress, but this time took some photos of my progress.  .   This sweater was turned into a cardigan.

First I cut up the middle of only the front part of the sweater, to create the cardigan opening.

Next, I folded of the right and left side of the new front sections to finish the front of the cardigan.  .

I cut a tapering cut up each side from the bottom to the shoulder of the sweater.   I then cut in a semi-circle indention on each side for the new sleeves to be placed.

I decided to use the entire length of the sweater sleeve on the new cartigan, so I just shaped and tapered each sleeve a little.

I then finished as I did the sweater dress, I cut off a little on the top of the shoulders to make the neck hole smaller, then I sewed up each side of the cardigan and the top of the sweater.  I then attached the new sleeves.    The new cardigan looks great on my daughter.

She worn each of the three new sweater items and decided that the fourth sweater, she wanted into another skirt.  So I made her another skirt in the same fashion as the first, but with this one I added some decorations on the bottom front to add a little flair.

Well that is what I did this week in my budget crafting corner.  I got to repourpose some nice sweaters I would not wear again, and my daughter got some wonderful new items in her closet.   Let me know what you think.  If you have any questions, suggestions or ideas.   I would love to help you work out some crafting problem or sewing problem you are having.

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Thanks for reading.

Brenda

Tags: budget, craft, green, recycle, repurpose, sweater