Skip to main content

DIY- turtleneck to cardi conversion

The local Salvation Army was having a half-price sale. ( Hurray!!!)  I picked up several cashmere sweaters. None cost more than $6. My husband got an orange v-necked sweater that was too big for him, so I serged it down to his size. The sweater looked awful on him until it was altered. Now it looks pretty spiffy.

I loved the color of this periwinkle blue cashmere turtleneck. I don't wear turtlenecks all that often, because like most New York apartments, my apartment is often over heated. If I were living back in Boston, I would be wearing turtlenecks all the time.

I knew I would be cutting the sweater open to make a cardigan. I just wasn't sure how I would edge it. I went with a fold over elastic. For those of you who don't sew, that's the satiny elastic that often is used to edge polar-fleece. I'm not sure if I love the edging. It will do for now. If I come up with a more clever idea I will replace the elastic with something cuter.

I have reached the point where I'm sick of winter and don't want to wear my winter coats any more despite it's being cold out. When I went out for a walk, I layered my new cardigan over a merino wool one and wore a leather jacket and a big scarf over the whole thing. That way, I can pretend that it's springtime.

The tutorial follows. If any of it is unclear, let me know and I can clarify.










Posted by Picasa
Labels:

Comments

  1. SandyMarch 21, 2011 at 12:20 PM

    thanks actually for describing fold over elastic. If you live where you haven't had opportunity to see any, but hang out on lists where everyone seems to be using it, it is difficult to work out if you really need it in your life! :)
    Sandy in the UK

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sarah JacobsMarch 21, 2011 at 1:28 PM

    Sandy...if you have lived this long without it...you can probably manage withoug. But it is nice to have around. I picked up a giant industrial sized spool at a notions store that was going out of business. As I type this I'm wearing a t- shirt I had made with velvet fold over elastic at the neckline. It's an easy and professional looking edge finish. But one can live a fulfilling sewing life with out it. ( Asyou have)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

I love hearing from my readers. I moderate comments to weed out bots.It may take a little while for your comment to appear.

Popular posts from this blog

Connecting with the past

A few months ago I had a craving for my father’s chicken fricassee.  If my father were still alive I would have called him up and he would have talked me through the process of making it.    My father is no longer alive so I turned to my cookbooks and the recipes I found for chicken fricassee were nothing at all like the stew of chicken necks, gizzards and wings in a watery sweet and sour tomato sauce that I enjoyed as a kid.  I assumed that the dish was an invention of my father’s. I then attempted to replicate the dish from my memory of it and failed.   A couple of weeks ago I saw an article on the internet, and I can’t remember where, that talked about Jewish fricassee  and it sounded an awful lot like the dish I was hankering after. This afternoon I went to the butcher and picked up all of the chicken elements of the dish, a couple of packages each of wings, necks and gizzards. My father never cooked directly from a cook book. He used to re...
1 comment
Read more

The light themed tallit has been shipped!!!

 I had begun speaking to Sarah about making her a tallit in the middle of August. It took a few weeks to nail down the design. For Sarah it would have been ideal if the tallit were completed in time for her to wear it on Rosh HaShanah., the beginning of her year as senior rabbi of her congregation. For me, in an ideal world, given the realities of preparing for the High Holidays I would have finished this tallit in the weeks after Sukkot. So we compromised and I shipped off the tallit last night.  I would have prefered to have more time but I got the job done in time. This tallit was made to mark Sarah's rise to the position of senior rabbi but it was also a reaction to this year of darkness. She chose a selection of verses about light to be part of her tallit. 1)  אֵל נוֹרָא עֲלִילָה  God of awesome deeds ( from a yom kippur Liturgical poem) 2)  אוֹר חָדָשׁ עַל־צִיּוֹן תָּאִיר   May You shine a new light on Zion ( from the liturgy) 3)  יָאֵר יְהֹ...
8 comments
Read more

A Passover loss

 My parents bought this tablecloth during their 1955 visit to Israel. It is made out of  linen from the first post 1948 flax harvest. The linen is heavy and almost crude. The embroidery is very fine. We used this cloth every Passover until the center wore thin.  You can see the cloth on the table in the background of this photo of my parents and nephew My Aunt Sheva bought my mother a replacement cloth. The replacement cloth is made out of a cotton poly blend. The embroidery is crude and the colors not nearly as nice. The old cloth hung in our basement. We used the new cloth and remembered the much nicer original cloth. I loved that my aunt wanted to replace the cloth, I just hated the replacement because it was so much less than while evoking the beauty of the original. After my father died my mother sat me down and with great ceremony gave me all of her best tablecloths. She also gave me the worn Passover cloth and suggested that I could mend it. I did. Year after year ...
2 comments
Read more