Sweater Refashion take 1 - Sweater to Cardigan

Since I am starting to get into the whole re-fashioning thing, I decided I needed to do something with these sweaters of my husbands. For some reason, since coming to Korea, the sweaters had shrunk and were like belly shirts on him. Perfect me size though! I didn't really know how this would go, so I chose my least favorite sweater (bottom left). I did a basic Sweater to Cardigan refashion. The whole thing took me 40 minutes! 

First, I turned the sweater inside out and put it on. I pinched along the seams and marked where the sweater fit me from the wrist to waist on each side.

I took off the sweater and sewed a wide stitch along the pin-line I had marked. You could also use a marking pen of some kind for this step. I hear sharpies work great (since it's inside out anyway).

After sewing, I tried the sweater on (still inside out) just in case it didn't fit right. To be safe, I sewed a second time over my original stitches.

Then I cut the excess sweater off. Since this sweater was slightly felted, I didn't zigzag the raw edges, but in other sweaters I would need to. 

Next I turned the sweater right side out and marked the midpoint down the front. (sorry, I forgot to take a picture!) I cut along the top layer from neck to waist. 

I pinned the open edges of the sweater at 3/4 inch. Again, if the sweater had been more loosely knit I would have zigzagged the edges first. 

For extra stability I decided to sew two lines onto my cardigan. It also kept the edge from becoming really bulky. You are suppose to use bias tape here, but I didn't have any and have no idea where to buy some : )

TADA! New cardigan! Since this is my first one, I'm not too worried that it doesn't look 100%. It's really warm and fits' me great! 

Notes for Next Time

1. I was afraid of making the sleeves too tight, so I didn't take in very much fabric. Next time I would make them a little tighter around my lower arm because they are kind of bunchy and baggy now. 

2. I didn't realize it until after I was finished, but this sweater has a stripe all the way around it. When I cut the sweater to my size, I forgot to match the stripes under my arm. Now, one stripe is slightly higher than the other.