Here is a recap. My challenge for June is to take 1 or 2 items from a thrift shop and make them into something else. Here are the 2 things I used this week.
Item 1 – a brown linen skirt with crochet detail around the bottom. (a truly hideous garment made worse by overstretching, personal taste of course)
Cost $1
Item 2 – a brown cotton skirt with a print that reminds me of dandelions and lovely black pen marks scribbled across the front.
Cost $1
Ta-da!
My son E modeling the result! Brown linen toddler pants with dandelion pockets.
Although that linen skirt was truly awful, I LOVE linen. I really LOVE linen pants for $1.
And I especially love linen pants with interesting and USEFUL pockets. A boy has to have a place to keep his treasures you know?..rocks, sticks, biscuits etc
My husband was a bit horrified when I showed him the skirts initially and said that E would be having pants made out of flowers, but he was fine with the result. I wanted to start with pants because I was a bit nervous at refashioning, having never done it before and I had made pants using this pattern before…just not quite this way.
I love using patterns that are traditionally considered to be feminine with a twist (like the silhouette dandelion print) on men or boys. I think if they are worn the right way they emphasise the masculinity (by contrast I suppose). These pants will be great in spring with a loose white shirt and sandals. They could equally be worn by a girl, but when I saw the skirt immediately thought of boys clothing.
I used my favourite pants pattern from here (the greatest shape I have found ANYWHERE!) combining the basic pants with the pocket pants.
I made the pants a bit bigger than the pattern to suit the loose nature of linen pants and because it made it possible to adapt the pattern pieces to fit the side seams of the skirt. Also, because I used the side seams of the linen skirt that already existed, I had to unpick the sides to insert the pockets and resew.
The bottom hem has been left fairly long underneath to allow for the rapid growth of a 2 year old boy! Folded and ready for Spring.
Although they aren’t perfect, I am happy with my first ever attempt at refashioning something into something else.
I am… satisfied.
Learning the Light 