What To Do With a Rag Bin Sweat Shirt

My husband and I hosted a number of foreign exchange students. Some were fun, some were a challenge and some left an imprint on our hearts. One of our boys was from Venezuela, but was of Italian decent. A GREAT kid. The most patient teenager I have ever met. He loved to go shopping ironically. Sadly, I would take him along with me and get caught up in things I wanted to look at and stay far longer than I had promised. I would apologize and he would always say, "No problem." Incredible. When he returned home, he left behind the sweat shirt pictured below. It had shrunk and so he could no longer wear it. It became mine. I would wear it on cold mornings when I just wanted something to easily pullover my pajamas. It had spots on the front of it and it was time to let it go...or so I thought. As I looked at it, I thought that maybe I could reinvent it. 

 And this is what I did! The flowers cover up the spots, so presto chango...no one will ever know.

I really had a good time with this little project. You can see that I cut 3 sizes of circles and just sewed in the middle,

 or did a crisscross over the circles. Some of the leaves were sewn only down the middle and others I added veins to. I wanted the flowers as well as the leaves to have a feeling of movement.

 The bottom of the skirt is the top of the sweat shirt. The little flounce at the hem is the armpit of the sleeve.

I cut a 5/8" wide strip and stitched it along the hem. 

The bottom band of the sweatshirt was cut open and then stitched back to the now skirt. To accent it and to give it a little more stability, I stitched 5/8" strips to the bottom, middle and top. The center strip covers up where the bottom band of the sweat shirt had been folded.

 Below you can see that the little flounce is the armpit of the sweat shirt. 

I even saved the tag and sewed it on the back side of the skirt. I thought it was a fun little accent.

Rather than the sweat shirt ending up in the garbage, it now has new life and I still have a little memento that brings back very happy memories. 

I'm working on a white turtleneck where I'll use the navy blue Nautica Competition stripes that ran down the arms so I have a little more repurposing left to do with this sweat shirt. Like I said, this has been a super fun project! Great way to start the new year!