Re-purposing: Turtle neck shirt to dress tutorial

Today I am going to show you how I took an old turtle neck shirt of mine and turned it into a dress for my daughter.

So, if you have an old shirt and would like to give it a try....grab it and give it a shot!!

It is so fun to take something old and make something new!!

I forgot to take a picture before I started this lovely project many months ago, so it is already attached to the bottom, but you get the idea what it looks like!

Just a normal shirt...right?

I started off by cutting off the turtle neck part, leaving about 1/4 of an inch.

Then from the part that I cut off, I took it and folded the ends in and iron flat.

Then fold again and iron flat

Then I pinned it all the way around the neckline and sewed it with a straight stitch.

Now for the sleeves, I wanted to add something to the boring old sleeve.

I marked with a pin where the middle of the sleeve was.

Then to get the gathered look, I sewed a large straight stitch about 5 inches up.
(Make sure you don't back stitch on either end)

Then take your top thread and gently pull and it will gather as you pull.

Then when you get it as ruffled as you want, I tied off the strings, or you can sew on top of the gathered part to keep it in place.

Now for the bottom part, I took my material and hemmed up all the sides.

At the top I also did a gathering stitch and then attached it to the shirt.

Here is a great tutorial on this part!

After you sew the two pieces together it should look like this.

Then I added a waistband to it with left over material.

What a great way to use an old shirt!!!

Give it a try...you will be glad you did!