Cobbled Creation

A couple years ago in an entrepreneurial spirit, I decided to make some things from sweaters to sell (scarves, handwarmers, etc). I did sell a few, but not enough to quit the day job.  Then I saw a sweater dress in a boutique that reminded me of two green sweaters I had bought, and always liked the colors together.  I thought, "Too bad that I chopped these all up into pieces, because I could have made a nice dress out of them."

This one was a zip-up cardigan (you are looking at it from the back, which is gone).  I had cut off part of the sleeves to make handwarmers and the back was cut into strips to make a ruffly scarf, which I never got around to doing.

This one became two sets of handwarmers, one from the sleeves and one from the front section - you can see it's missing.
Well then I started thinking about how all the fabric was there in those light green strips, and could I put the zipper in the back and weave the strips together in some way to make a front that completely covered me?  And what about the sleeves of the dark green sweater, could they fill in the gaps on the front side if I put the patched-together part in the back?  So after a seemingly unending amount of pinning, basting, trying on, sewing and ripping, I ended up with this:

The purple bit is a piece of sweater left over from another project.  I like purple and green together but it also covers up the waist seam, which is just a little ragged since I just tucked the light green underneath the dark green and sewed around it, rather than doing a normal seam which I think would have made a bulge. I ended up taking out the zipper because it was metal and uncomfortable, and you didn't need it to get the dress on because the bottom sweater has some spandex in it.  I also fussed a lot trying to get the sleeves as long as possible, because to me if it's cold enough to wear a sweater dress then it's too cold to wear short sleeves. So here is a close up showing how some the things were pieced together.

I often have the mentality of, "I want x idea to work out, and I am going to make it happen even if it kills me," instead of going for something easier.  In the end it does make for a lot of work but I'm usually happy with the result.