Make Mittens From Used Sweater

The day after Thanksgiving is traditionally the single largest business day in the American retail calendar. But people were not born to shop, its a learned behaviour. Buy Nothing Day actions only require that the participants spend a day without spending.

Make some mittens to help curb your consumption:

1. Reuse something you were gonna throw away ( an old sweater )
2. Don't spend any money making this
3. Make it more difficult for yourself to reach in your pocket, wallet, or purse... and spend $$$
4. One of a kind MITTENS!!! How can you go wrong???

From the Adbusters website:
Reasons for participating in Buy Nothing Day are as varied as the people who choose to participate. Some see it as an escape from the marketing mind games and frantic consumer binge that has come to characterize the holiday season, and our culture in general. Others use it to expose the environmental and ethical consequences of overconsumption.

This instructable was inspired by an ad on the back page of the November/December 2007 issue of Adbusters magazine.

**** Just got a link from my dad... Martha Stewart had a holiday segment where they made this type of mittens and other used sweater craft. Here is the link Craft Sweater Mittens Etc*********

Step 1: What You Need

***** for this instructable it is important that you don't buy anything, it's an exercise in the reuse of materials that are normal discarded. Reuse is similar in importance to Reduce and should be practiced with Recycle as a final step or possibility. For more information about this, I recommend Heather Rogers' book Gone Tomorrow, The Hidden Life of Garbage*****

1. An Old Sweater... preferably one you don't to wear anymore ( like the one you got from your aunt for x-mas)

2. Paper for pattern (I used regular printer/copy paper)

3. Scissors

4. Thread ( dental floss will work if you don't have any thread)

5. Needle (for sewing).

That's really all you need for these mittens, but you can also add whatever else you feel necessary. I used some other old sweaters and fabric I had around the house for the lettering.

Step 2: Pattern : Trace Your Hand

Put your hand on the paper, then trace it.

Make sure you leave enough room around your thumb and fingers. Once sewn, the mittens will be turned inside out, so you need some extra room. This is something I found out by making these mittens. I made the thumbs a little bit too small. They still work, but comfort is important so its best to leave yourself enough room.

Step 3: Cut Out Material

Pin your template to your old sweater.
Then, cut out the material using the pattern as a template.

Step 4: Cut Out More Material

You probably have two hands and each mitten will have two sides so math says that you will need 4 of these total.
Repeat the cut out step until you have more mitten pieces to sew together. Again, you'll need four... two for each hand... front and back.
This picture shows enough for one mitten. I flipped the pattern so that both mittens will look the same on the front. Sweaters usually look different on the front than they do on the inside.

Step 5: Sew Mitten Pieces Together

Yep... place one on top of the other and sew around the edges.
I don't think it makes too much difference what type of stitch you use, but make sure its pretty tight so that the mittens don't come apart.

Repeat this step for both mittens.

Step 6: Inside Out

Flip the mittens inside out.
Now your seam will be on the inside.

Step 7: Two Mittens: Customize

So you should have two mittens now. Depending on the sweater you used, they might be kinda boring.

Add whatever you want on the outside to make them your own.

I made mine for Buy Nothing Day so I cut out some letters from another sweater and stitched them on top.

Step 8: Try Them Out!!!

Yep, my mittens fit.

And they also hamper my ability to take money out of my wallet. Perfect.
Now I'm ready for corporate holiday season!!!! YEaH!!!!1!!