Weekend DIY - Cashmere Sweater to Pillow

Hope everyone had a great weekend!  Thanks for all the well wishes last week!  I'm feeling better and ready to get this week going and actually ticking some stuff off my "to do" list.  One of the biggies on my list is getting the husband's closet cleaned out and organized (the man has more clothes and shoes than I do with most of it being worn out or just not used any longer).  As I emptied out his closet I ran across this lovely grey cashmere sweater.  Great, right?  Only not.  Because the darn front was chock full of moth holes (great).  Well, I just couldn't throw away all that cashmere, I put it aside and thought about what I could do with it. 

Ah ha, I could try and sew a pillow cover out of that sweater.  I had a leftover bolster pillow insert from my girls worn out chair we got a few years ago.   Let the fun begin!

The sweater before the cutting began.

Cut the sleeves off (to use later) and got the back isolated so the sewing could begin.

Folded the back of the sweater (facing inside out) horizontally to the top of the shoulders and started hand stitching (I don't have a sewing machine).  Just a quick and dirty straight stitch across the whole thing.

The bolster insert

Turned the now tubular back of the sweater so that the stitching is on the inside and pulled the tube over the bolster.

Since the tube didn't cover the ends of the bolster I decided to cut the ends of the sleeves off, use the widest part of the sleeve (from shoulder to about elbow) to cover each end.

Turning it inside out, I took the elbow side of the cut off sleeve and just gathered the open end and just stitched it together (again by hand).  Nothing fancy just so it holds together.

Turn the sewn sleeve part so that the stitching is on the inside and then I slipped the sleeve over both ends of the bolster and tucked it under the tube sewn earlier.

Then I just tucked the raw edge of the tube against the sewn sleeve caps and just stitched over it (again quickly and by hand).  I used black thread I had in my sewing kit.  Could I have gone out and bought some grey thread so it matched?  Sure.  Did I want to buy something for this project?  No. The challenge with this DIY was to use what I had on hand to create something useful with out spending any $.

Here's how it looks when the whole thing is stitched.  Not bad right?  We'll call it "charmingly rustic".

Here's the finished bolster on the sofa.  It's not perfect but it is useful.  And so soft.  If the cats or kid eventually messes it up then no harm no foul.

Have a great Monday!