Okay, so maybe I shouldn’t be calling them ornaments, because I am pretending that I am being seasonally appropriate and not decorating for Christmas yet, but I think we all know the truth…

So, you may have seen that I recently bought some sweaters from the thrift store and made cozy pillow covers. There were still the sleeves, collar, and other parts of the sweater left, and I wanted to find a use for those, too. I was browsing for ideas and saw some adorable knit ornaments – umm, I mean general fall/winter decorative balls… so I decided to make some of my own.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• Styrofoam balls
• Serrated knife
• Old sweaters
• Needle and embroidery floss

Here’s how to do it:

• Prepare your styrofoam balls – use a serrated knife to cut the top and bottom off (top left picture below). When you sew the sweater closed, it will create some bulky seams at the top and bottom of the ball, and this makes space for that bulk, so your ball still looks round
• Cut a section of sweater and sew it into a sleeve. I didn’t measure exactly, but the ideas is that the sleeve is narrow enough that it has to be stretched over the widest part of the ball and then tapers naturally to the top and bottom. I was able to make multiple patterns from the same two sweaters by using the sweaters inside out and right-side out; horizontal or vertical
• Pull the sleeve over the ball (top right picture below)
• Sew a loose running stitch around the top (bottom left picture below)
• Pull the thread tight, while tucking the seam inside the ball. Tie a knot and them hide the ends under the sweater (bottom right picture below)
• Repeat on the other end
• If these were ornaments, which they are not (yet), then you could use some yarn or floss to attach a hanging loop…

Bowl of balls:

I’ve got one more idea up my sleeve (hahahahahahahahaha) to use parts of this sweater for Christmas (I mean general fall/ winter) decorating!

Julie aka “Jewels”