it’s a wrap!

T-shirt scarves may loop only once but with all their strands they wrap around and around and around!  Actually I can’t decide if this is more a scarf or a necklace; it’s a hybrid, I think: soft and loopy like a scarf, but weather-penetrable like a necklace.

My friend Meghan came over to cut up old T-shirts with me.  Hers was way more intricate, involving sewing together all these big loops and re-wrapping the sewn part with fabric left over from the T-shirt so the seams were…um, seamless?  It was cool.  Maybe she will post a photo on her blog.  (Nudge, nudge, Meghan!)

So we had fun cutting–and, oh my goodness–learning, from this wildly enthusiastic crafter, to sharpen scissors!  I had a sharpener but it had been so long since I used it that I couldn’t remember what to do.

Super ridiculous, right?  It’s not hard at all!  Less than two minutes into the video I realized how helpless I was acting, sharpened my scissors and moved on.  Then Meghan and I wondered, “If the question was answered within the first third of the video, what was the rest of it about?”  (i.e. Why is it six minutes long?!)  I’m proud to say we didn’t stop crafting to find out.  However, our speculation only deepened when my husband noticed the 6-minute video is labeled “Part 1.”  Really?  You need two parts to explain sharpening scissors?  If you’re really curious, she’s really thorough….

Back to scarves, shall we?  Here’s the site I used for my guideline.  My only real issue with this…

…was that it left me with exposed seams from the original shirt, which I didn’t like.

Meghan, who I mentioned was stylishly using her leftover jersey fabric to cover the “joints,” suggested I try just wrapping more fabric around the ugly parts, so I did that.  I thought it looked better.

I should have done the same thing with the main “ugly” area, the top of the loop I started with when cutting all the smaller strips.  Instead I covered that spot with ribbon left from a previous project.

After wrapping, tying a knot, and sewing the ends down, I ended up also adding some glue because the very edges of the ribbon were fraying.  I was afraid they’d fray right out of my amateur stitching.  This was my first time making a scarf like this; if I had it to do over I’d probably stick to all one type of fabric.  I could still cover the ribbon with jersey, so it’s not ruined or anything.

I made a simpler scarf out of a jersey dress I didn’t wear at all this year.  Or maybe I wore it once.  At any rate, it wasn’t earning its keep so I decided to repurpose it.

The body of the dress was quite a bit longer than the body of the T-shirt, so I decided to see how it would look unslashed.

I like this look better.  It’s more of a cowl, I guess, but it’s less ambiguous than the multi-looped scarf/necklace thing.

Which look do you prefer?  Have you tried the swoopy-loopy T-shirt scarf trend yet?  Link me a photo if you have!  Maybe you just style yours cuter than mine.