Cardigan Tutorial

I had some extra cardigans lying around that I never wore anymore. So I thought I might as well do something with them. I figured I could cut them up and make a much cuter cardigan for my little baby girl. My little sister wanted to see how I did it so I figured I might as well make a tutorial. And this is it. So here we go!
SUPPLIES:

-cardigan

-scissors

-thread

-sewing machine :)

Here is the before shot of my cardigan. First I cut apart the cardigan. I cut the sleeves off and then cut the front and back pieces apart.

Then I cut the bottom cuff off about 1/4-1/2 inch above the detail. This step can be done before you cut the front and back piece apart if you prefer to do it that way. It doesn't really matter.

Next you will take one of your child's shirts that fits them pretty good (loosely would be nice) and fold it inside out with the sleeves inside the shirt. Then fold the shirt in half.

Then unbutton the front piece and lay the two pieces on top of each other. Next you will lay your child's shirt on top of the front pieces and cut out the shape about 1/2 an inch or so away from the shirt. (In this picture I placed the shirt at the bottom -I was going to try something else- but it works out much better if you cut out the cardigan from the top. I just didn't take another picture. Oops.) After you cut out the main shape, I also like to cut the arm hole a little bigger because the cardigan armhole will need to be big enough to fit comfortably over a shirt worn underneath.

Then you will cut the top piece off to get the length you want. When cutting the length of your top piece, make sure you cut it about 3/4 inch below a button. Here is what it will look like all cut out. (I cut mine off pretty short because I wanted a shorter cardigan, but if you want a long one then just adjust the length to what you would like. Remember, you will be sewing the cuff back on the bottom, so it will end up longer than what you cut out the top piece.)

Then button the front piece back up and it'll look something like this.

Next, you will lay the front piece on top of the back piece, lining up the shoulder seams as best you can. Then cut out the back piece to match the front.

Next we need to cut out the sleeves. Make sure your cardigan sleeves are folded right (with the inside seam right on the fold) and lay both sleeves on top of each other. Again, you will take one of your child's shirts that has a good sleeve length and lay it on top of the new sleeves you will be cutting out. This will give you a general idea of where to cut. I like to put a pin on the sleeve you are going to cut about 1/2 inch above the shoulder seam and armpit seam in the peach shirt pictured below to give you an idea of where to cut. This allows for your seam allowance. Then you will remove the peach shirt and cut out your sleeve. Make sure you don't cut a straight line but a curve. Remember it doesn't have to be exact.

You can also make these sleeves shorter if you want to. I ended up cutting mine out so they would be 3/4 length sleeves. Here are all the pieces you have cut out so far.

You will now sew the cuff onto the bottom of the shirt pieces. I would unbutton everything and line up the corresponding cuff with the corresponding piece. I like to cut my cuff about 1/2 inch shorter than the actual piece I will be sewing it on to. That way it cinches in a little around the bottom. But you don't have to do this.

After you cut the cuff pieces to the right length, put right sides together and sew the cuff onto each piece. (Sorry there isn't a picture. If you have troubles figuring this out let me know and I will try and explain it better. Hopefully it makes sense.)

Then you will sew the completed front piece onto the back piece. It helps if you button the shirt up again so you don't sew the wrong front piece to the wrong side. It doesn't matter if you sew the shoulder seams or the side seams first. Just make sure that you place right sides together before you sew. Here is how it should look all sewn together.The sleeves we cut out are usually too wide to fit into your new baby sized armhole, so I just turn them inside out and sew a seam down the side. I just kind of line it up with my new armhole to see how big it needs to be and put a pin in the top to mark where I should start my seam. Again this doesn't need to be exact. Knit is very forgiving and you can stretch it to fit. Here is a picture of the seam I sewed down the inside of my sleeves.

Be sure to trim down the seam after you have this new seam sewn in the sleeves. Now you will pin your sleeves into each armhole. If you can't figure out how to pin the sleeve in, this is kind of how I do that: I have the shirt and sleeve right side out, and line up the sleeve where it would go. Then I fold the shirt part back over the top of the sleeve and pin. It kind of looks like this. Then sew the sleeves on. I use a 1/2 seam allowance but you can really use whatever you are comfortable with.

And after all of that, you have yourself a brand new baby cardigan!

I decided to embellish mine a little and made a flower pin out of some scraps.

Here is another one I did out of a pink cardigan of mine. This one has the long sleeves and a full length torso. The embellishment was already on the sweater. Bonus!Anyway, there is my cardigan tutorial. Hopefully it made sense. Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions and I will do my best to answer them. Have fun!