Two Crafty Brownies

'Take One' PreLoved Jumper Part 3 - Pincushion, Little Hearts and Teddy

Hello my dears! I hope you've had a good week. All is well here in my little corner of London. The sun has been shining, and thoughts of Spring have started to emerge.

Did you see Lucy’s lovely pot holders, lavender heart and mug warmer? That pretty shirt certainly went a long way! Today I am finishing off my jumper, and I have to admit, I am glad. Lucy will tell you, I have a terrible habit of getting bored of projects. I find something new, and research and make obsessively for a few weeks. Then one day, I wake up, and poof! I'm bored. Time for something new! That's why I could never settle down to just one craft. Don't get me wrong, I am envious of people who do…. I just have too short an attention span!

So I have to say I picked up the scraps I had left after my hot water bottle cover and my wristwarmers with a tiny bit of Resentment. I have had enough of this jumper, I thought. But Lu had made so many lovely little things, and not wanting to let the side down, I got sewing.

Lu is really good at appliqué. Her stitches are soooo neat. I am not so good. But I do like a bit of reverse appliqué (is that a thing??). When you sew some fabric to the back and cut around so it shows through. Stay with me, you'll see what I mean….

Reverse Appliqué Felt Pin Cushion

What you need is

Two small squares of that jumper

Some contrasting fabric

Tracing paper, I use grease proof paper!

Matching thread

Ground walnut shells

Two Crafty Brownies Sewing Essentials

 What you do is

Cut two squares of felt. I decided to make my pincushion 3” square, and I added half an inch seam allowance so my pieces were 4” by 4”. Sorry, Lu, I did not make a template......

Draw your design on the tracing paper. I did a simple little flower. Layer your paper, design up, on top of your fabric, right side down. Lay this onto your felted fabric, right side down. Pin the layers in place. Sew on top of your design, right through the three layers.

Pull off your tracing paper. Carefully poke the end of your scissors through the jumper but not through the fabric and cut around close to your stitch line.

Finally lay your felt squares right sides together and sew around, leaving a gap to turn it through. Once turned, stuff (I used ground walnut shells) and admire!

Little Felt Hearts

These little hearts are inspired by Faith Essenberg’s Liberty Heartstrings, which I think are so adorable.

What you need is

Felt pieces

Heart template (I had this from before, cut out of acetate)

Tracing paper

Matching/contrasting thread

buttons and string

Toy stuffing

Two Crafty Brownies Sewing Essentials

What you do is

Take two pieces of felt and trim them to the same size and shape. Cut a piece of tracing paper about the same size of your two felt pieces. Trace hearts onto the paper, leaving space between. I will not be turning these through, I'll leave the seam on the outside. Pin the layers together, paper on top, then the two pieces of felt, one right side up and then the other right side down. Sew around the hearts, leaving a gap on each one for stuffing. Remove the paper carefully.

Stuff each heart (I used toy stuffing), and sew across the gap. Back stitch wherever you stop, you can then use a needle to take the threads through to in between the layers and cut short. Cut around each heart as you finish it, or do them all at the end......

I used some pretty buttons from Lucy’s Attic 24 shop on Wool Warehouse, and some pink string. I threaded most of them into a length and a couple separately. Luckily I was also able to source a bit of matching chocolate to keep me going....

Little Teddy

From my last bits, I made this little teddy. I drew a template and transferred this onto tracing paper. I may have had a little shandy to help me at this point....

I used the reverse appliqué method above to do a tummy, ears and paws.

I left a gap for stuffing, and cut all around him once he was filled and the gap sewn closed.

Phew! It feels like I've been working on this jumper for ages. I am really pleased with all I managed to get out of it, and I am inspired to go searching through the charity shops again soon, (just not too soon!)

Take care, my lovelies, until my next post! And thanks for the jumper, Lu!

 

Jenny xxx

'Take One' Pre-Loved Jumper Part 2 - Wrist Warmers

Hello lovelies! It's been cold round here this week....... how have you been? I have been using the sleeves of my pre-loved jumper to make some wrist warmers. I have very cold hands........ good for making pastry but not so good for examining patients! I love wearing wrist warmers to keep my hands warm in winter. I sadly can't wear them at work (infection control you know....) but I wear them at home on these chilly days.

What you need is

The sleeves of a preloved jumper that has been felted/shrunk

matching buttons

matching embroidery thread

Two Crafty Brownies Sewing Essentials

 What you do is

Mark where you want your thumbhole to be by laying your hand on the sleeve. Position your hand so the top is where you want it to be. Put your hand in the sleeve if that helps! Do be careful, lovelies, I did prick myself and may have said a Bad Word.

Cut a very narrow strip between the pins for your thumb. If you try it on now, you will see it’s a bit baggy around the wrist. This is where we get to embellish however we like, and make it fit better. So then cut up the opposite side. Overlap the edges so they fit your wrist and pin into place. Depending how tight your sleeve is, you may want to cut up both sides and pin/sew a seam under your thumb as well as on the other side.

Choose some matching buttons and thread. I think the potential for different embellishments is huge. Here I decided to use buttons and a running stitch.

I have a few jumpers I have collected over the past few months. They have been sitting waiting to be used, and in order to do this post I finally got round to making a few different wrist warmers!

Lu has been nagging begging me to make her a pair, so I let her choose a colour and made her a grey pair..... here she is having a nice cuppa while we work..

And I am very pleased with all the pairs I have kept........shall I wear them, or give them away?

Next week Lu will be using the last bits of her shirt to make more pretty things, and I'll be back the week after with some little felt things.

Happy friday, lovelies!

Jenny xxx

'Take One' Pre-Loved Jumper Part 1: Hot Water Bottle Cover

Hello lovelies! I do hope you have had a good week. It's been a couple of weeks since I posted, Lucy has been in charge, using a pretty pre-loved Boden shirt to make a gorgeous skirt and a clever peg bag, which I can't wait to try making myself. Now I'm back, talking about jumpers.

The Story

Have you ever washed a jumper too hot and shrunk it? I certainly have, in fact I have even done this on purpose!! Are you shocked? The thing is, when you shrink a jumper made from natural fibres, you get felt! Or in any case, a lovely, soft, thick material which doesn’t fray. I spent a few months trawling through charity shops looking for jumpers, I asked friends to give me old jumpers, I weeded some old ones out of our cupboards. I washed them on a 90C cycle. Some didn't shrink. So they went back to the charity shop. But some did, and I have been having a lot of fun sewing them into things! Today, I'm making a hot water bottle cover to snuggle up with on cold nights.

Hot Water Bottle Cover

What you need is

A pre-loved jumper, washed and shrunk. Lu gave me this one, it's one of our very favourite colours.

A hot water bottle ( I bought mine from our local pound shop)

Matching thread, buttons

Coordinating fabric (adhesive or lined with Bondaweb) 

Two Crafty Brownies Sewing Essentials

What  you do is

Turn your jumper inside out. Cut the sleeves off, and cut up the sides. Lay your hot water bottle on the piece you want to use for the front.  I decided to use the inside as the outside as it looked a bit nicer...... (well, it has been well loved!).

Draw all around it with a fabric marker. Leave enough around for a bit of stretch and a seam allowance. I used 2cm. Cut around your front piece. To make it symmetrical, I marked it in half with a pin, folded it in half and used the first half as a template for the second. Oh it was such a dreary day in London, lovelies, the pictures are not great.

For the back, there will be 2 overlapping pieces, so each needs to be longer than a half, if you see what I mean. I used my front as a template, folding one third of the bottom up to cut the top, and folding a third of the top to cut the bottom. I don't blame you if you need to go off and lie down now for a bit……

Hem the edges of your back pieces. If your jumper is thick you may not need to, mine is quite thin so I think it'll need the extra stability. I used a zig-zag stitch as the fabric is stretchy.

Pin your front and back together, with the right sides together (for me this was actually the inside of the jumper, as I wanted this to be the final outside..... On the back, lay the bottom piece on top of the top piece if you want the top piece to be on the outside. Sew all the way around, I went back and forth a few times where the pieces overlapped to make it stronger for opening. Turn it inside out!

When I hemmed the edges, the fabric stretched a bit. In order to make the opening nice and tight, I made sure I pulled the edges out and trimmed off the excess.

Now here I thought it looked a bit dull. I decided to hand stitch around it with a blanket stitch, and embellish the front with some hearts. If I were doing this again, of course I would put on the hearts before I sewed the front and back together. I can just imagine Lucy is rolling her eyes right now……

Let me digress just for a moment to tell you a little about how Lu and I roll. Lu is a planner. She makes lists, keeps notes and generally does things way ahead of time. Darlings, I am not. I wing it quite often, let things develop as I go along, and am often doing things at the last minute! In many ways we are very similar, but in this we are not! We work really well together though, I think I help Lu worry less, while she certainly helps me slow down and think things through first....

So, back to our hot water bottle cover…… Lu bought me some lovely adhesive fabric from Tiger ( not sure of you have this in other countries…….it's like IKEA but without all the furniture!) I cut out 3 hearts, stuck them on and sewed around them with some embroidery thread.

And that's my hot water bottle cover! I can't wait to try it out one of these cold nights......

I must say a big thank you to my Photographer, without whom I couldn't have done the lap pictures. My big, gorgeous son, J.......

That's all from me for now, lovelies! I'll be back next week, turning the sleeves into a pair of cosy wrist warmers....stay tuned and have a lovely weekend!

Jenny xxx