Sweat Shirt Sleeve Sweatpants Eco-friendly Craft Tutorial

Sleeves cut from sweatshirts can be recycled into sweatpants for toddlers. This easy to follow, simple eco-friendly sewing craft saves money on the clothing bill while utilizing otherwise wasted craft leftovers.

Materials and supplies needed for the sweatshirt sleeve sweatpants recycled sewing craft:

Two sweatshirt sleeves

Elastic for waistband

Scissors

Sewing kit

Pair of existing sweatpants to use as a model

Sweatshirt sleeve sweatpants recycled sewing craft step one; obtain sweatshirt sleeves and elastic:

There are several crafts which involve cutting sleeves off sweatshirts. By making sleeveless sweatshirt vests, sleeves are obtained while retaining a very useful sweatshirt. If a sweatshirt is made into a short sleeved sweatshirt by removing the entire sleeves and sewing on T-shirt sleeves, a set of sweatshirt sleeves are also obtained. Sweatshirt sleeves can also be obtained if the sweatshirt is recycled into a pillowcase or a durable reusable grocery bag craft. Sleeves might also be leftover while making comfortable fleece pajamasfrom hoodies or sweatshirts.

Elastic is obtained from any outgrown and stained, ratty, or otherwise unusable garment that has a waistband elastic.

Sweatshirt sleeve sweatpants recycled sewing craft step two; assembling the pants:

Spread out the sweatshirt sleeves so the seams are inside. Cut open a quarter of each seam starting at the cut end. If the waist is too wide, remove a triangle of cloth starting at the end of the open seam up to the cut end. When measuring, disregard any excess height of either side of the pants, using only the middle length as a guide. The extra cloth on the sides can be cut, or saved for folding over later.

Sweatshirt sleeve sweatpants recycled sewing craft step three, completing the pants:

Turn both sleeves inside out and sew the edges together, to make the recycled sweat pants. To install the elastic, stretch the elastic out to the size of the cloth using a piece of cardboard and then sew the elastic to the inside of the pants. This ensures even distribution of elastic. Sew so the edge of the sleeve folds over inside; if the extra length was kept, it can fold down and cover parts of the elastic. The recycled sweatpants craft is complete.

Sweatshirt sleeve sweatpants recycled sewing craft alterations:

For a younger toddler's pants, cut deeper the slit down the sleeve seam. Here cloth can cover the entire elastic due to the surplus. For an older toddler, cut the sleeves off three quarters to the bottom and thus make sweatpants shorts. Made correctly, these recycled sweatshirt sleeve sweatpants can be given to relatives or to charity should there be nobody in the family who can fit them.