A little backstory: something I've been thinking about a lot lately is needing vs. wanting. In downsizing our living quarters and the impending Great Move of 2011 to our first house (!), it makes me stop and think twice before I buy anything new that isn't a necessity. Such as the plastic dog nose costume accessory I had in my hand yesterday (weird you say? but, but, I had the EXACT same one when I was a kid!). I put it back, thank you.
So that leads me to repurpose things we already have around into new items. Hello, upcycling! So when you're left with the arms and neck of your sweater that you turned into a pillow—you mean you haven't done that yet?—it's great to have every little bit reused. And it helps keep trash out of a landfill!
So (drumroll), I turned the sleeves into a draft-dodger for our breezy sliding door. The photo below is what I was left with from the pillow, so I started by snipping off the neck...
The I stitched up the sleeve openings and the neck opening with matching embroidery floss.
I needed something to weight the thing down so it would do its job dodging drafts (or running into them head first?), so I picked up two packs of dried beans at Target.
Then I distributed the beans across the length of the arms, and filled the rest of the space with stuffing.
Then I stitched up the bottom opening, and put my little-bit-wonky-looking-but-still-functional dodger to work.
For the leftover neck—I don't have photos—but I am planning on cutting it in half horizontally (to keep it formed in a tube shape), and making a reusable coffee cup sleeve, although the diameter will have to be adjusted. With the other half, I'm going to make sweet little votive cup sleeves in the same way as the coffee sleeve, but adjusted to the size of the votives. Perfect for wintery décor, no?
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