Six Felted Crafts to Make with Old Wool Sweaters

The next time you accidentally throw a favorite wool sweater in the laundry with the rest of your clothes and pull it out later only to find it has shrunk to itty bitty proportions, don't write it off as doll clothes and give it to the nearest six year-old or throw it away. Hang on to it, shrink some other stuff on purpose, and get ready to make felted crafts from old wool sweaters.

If you're looking for green Christmas gifts or handmade birthday gifts that your friends and family will love, try one of these six felted crafts.

Felting (or Fulling) Old Wool Sweaters
Felting, also sometimes called fulling, is so easy that people do it by accident all the time. Simply make sure that the sweater you're trying to felt is at least 50% real wool (100% works best - skip that acrylic stuff), and avoid trying to felt sweaters that say "superwash" on the tag. Those have been treated by some sort of chemical to resist shrinkage when accidentally tossed in the laundry.

Next, put your sweater (or sweaters, if you're doing a batch) inside a pillowcase, close the pillowcase tightly with a rubberband, and launder on hot. Finish with a cold rinse and a cycle in a hot dryer.

Voila... doll sweaters! Wait, don't you want to use those felted sweaters for something useful? To use them cut along the seams to get several pieces of fabric and remove the ribbing, depending on what kind of project you're doing.

Six Felted Craft Projects
If you're like me and you're trying to start brainstorming warm and cozy homemade Christmas gifts (or thoughtful, unique birthday presents), you might give one of these projects a try.

1. Crazy Quilt-Inspired Throw Pillow
Have you ever seen a crazy quilt? Bits of oddly-shaped scraps of fabric are sewn together to make a quilt, like this one. It may look difficult, but you don't have to be a quilting expert to make a crazy quilt-inspired throw pillow. Here's how to do it:

Arrange your scraps ahead of time in a square roughly the size of the pillow you want to end up with and piece them together either by hand-stitching or on your sewing machine. Cut a piece of coordinating fabric for the back of your pillow (maybe some recycled corduroy from an old skirt?), place it and your crazy quilt pieces right side together, and pin. Stitch almost all the way around your pillow, leaving a hole big enough to fit your hand in.

Turn the pillow right-side out and stuff with polyfill or some sort of recycled filling if you'd prefer. Hand-stitch the hole closed with a hidden stitch - here's a good tutorial if you're not sure how.

2. Stylish Handwarmers
For this easy project, simply cut the sleeves off your felted sweater in the length you want your handwarmers to be (wrist, mid-forearm or elbow). Leave the ribbing on the sleeves for a shortcut and you won't have to hem the edges closest to your hands. Fold the raw edge inward on the top end of the handwarmers and stitch into place. Cut a hole for your thumb, fold the raw edges inward and stitch. For baby handwarmers, felt a child-sized wool sweater, and for larger sizes, felt an adult, medium or large wool sweater.

3. Toasty Warm Quilt
If you're looking for some extra warmth this winter, make a cuddly and warm felted wool quilt. Collect several sweaters and felt them, then cut along the seams so you have larger pieces of felt to work with. Cut uniformly-sized squares and hand sew or machine stitch them together. To flatten bumpy seams, carefully steam with an iron on the steam setting, not actually touching the fabric. For an extra cozy quilt, you can add a coordinating fabric backing and quilt batting on the inside. Simply layer, stitch and sew together, edging with wide bias tape or blanket edging to neaten it up.

4. Cuddly Mittens
To make felted wool mittens, felt your sweaters and cut the seams to get the widest pieces possible to work with. For a pattern, trace each of your hands on a piece of paper or paper grocery bag, fingers together and thumb stretched wide so you have room to add a half-inch or so for a seam allowance. Cut out two of each hand, stitch together, leaving a hole at the bottom for your hand to get in, and turn inside out. If you do this right, you can leave ribbing on the bottom of the mitten from the cuff or around the waistband so you have a tighter-fitting, finished edge.

5. Recycled Felt Purse
For this project, depending on the side of your purse, you might need to find the largest wool sweater possible to felt. As for instructions, I found this article at Chic Knits that explains it much better than I could: How to Make a Re-Cycled Felt Purse. The author of the article even added a cute crocheted trim, but if you'd prefer not to, simply fold your raw edge over and stitch to finish.

6. Coffee Cup Cozy
I always hate using those little cardboard sleeves that coffeeshops put around my to-go cups to keep me from burning my hand - they seem like such a waste. To make a green alternative to those little sleeves, take a used to-go cup and a flexible measuring tape and measure around the middle to get the diameter. Straighten out your tape to find the length of fabric you'll need and add. Cut a rectangle out with this length, leaving a smidge extra for seam allowance, hem top and bottom edges (or leave them raw if you prefer), and stitch the ends together to make a circle. Turn right-side out. Decorating your cozy with cute lace or ribbon is optional.

Felting wool sweaters is a fun and easy way to make homemade Christmas gifts and thoughtful birthday presents. Not only will you be giving a useful, environmentally-friendly gift, but your friends and family will be thrilled to receive something so totally unique.