Sewing and Recycling

When I was much, much younger, my mother taught me how to sew. She is a WONDERFUL seamstress, and I grew up in her creations. Just about everything I owned/loved was made by her. I like to think of her as a modern pioneer-woman: she quilts, cans, gardens, composts, paints, and I'm pretty sure if she ended up in the middle of the woods, the whole place would be turned into a working farm with an azalea-lined cottage in the middle by the end of the day. I, on the other hand, am not blessed with her green thumb. Or her patience. Or her sewing ability. But lately I've taken up the sewing machine again as I find myself with things I want to repurpose. Like this little project: Fleece Blanket to Jacket Fleece is expensive. Pricey enough that I don't want to experiment with it, although I drooled over some of the patterns. And then I found the blanket. Poor, rejected blanket that had the cutest pattern on it! Monsters on one side, turquoise on the other. I had to mess with it. So I took an old sweatshirt pattern and cut out a general idea of what I wanted...and then kept cutting.

I added cuffs on the sleeves, split it up the center, decided I wanted a hood and pockets, and a giant button in the middle. And I tried it on - it was HUGE. Lesson 1: You can always make it smaller. I pinned and sewed and by the end of the day had something fun to show for it:

Silly? Yes! Fun? Definitely! And since then, I've added a chunky zipper up the middle and kept the button (I really like that button). And, as I'm sure you have noticed from the on-going terrible quality of my pictures, I don't have a real camera persay. I use my old phone as a point and shoot, and this results in not-so-great shots. But, I am taking pictures! And sharing them! Which means I'm meeting another one of my goals. Score!