5 Upcycling Projects for Beginners! | DIY Clothes Easy Sewing

So you're learning how to sew, and you want some easy DIY upcycling projects that are fashion-related. I got you. Hi everyone, I'm Angelina, and this is Blueprint DIY, where we remake our clothes to be just as unique as us. Today, I have five, not 10, five upcycling projects, DIY, that you can do that are going to be easy and for beginners. I'm gonna start you off with something that is a no-sew project, and rosettes are in. And so you can take a sewing needle. You can also do this with your machine if you know how to ruffle. But I'm gonna start you off with this one because all you need is a needle and thread. And here, I use T-shirts, like old T-shirts, and cut about two or three-inch strips of them, and took the needle with the thread on it, and just went in and out, in and out, in the middle of the strip. And then that gathers it. As you pull that thread, that gathers it. ♪ Oh, I never felt nothing right like I do now ♪ Then you fold it over, and then you twirl it around, and now you have a rosette. ♪ Baby, don't give me love, I can't fake it ♪ ♪ When I'm with you, my legs go weak, yeah ♪ With this, you can make chokers, you can make pendants, you can make belts, whatever you wanna make with it. You can actually sew it, hand-sew it onto garments, and just have rosettes wherever you like. So this is definitely an upcycling trick that you can play with if you're a beginner, and even if you're not. You can definitely use more than just T-shirts. Try men's dress shirts, try leather, try denim, whatever you wanna use. And all the links to the full tutorials for this will be in the description box. They go nice and slow, so they're easier to follow along. All right, so when I say learning how to sew, in general, I mean learning how to sew on a sewing machine. And did you know that with just two straight stitches, you can take in a skirt or a pair of pants that don't have pockets? And as a beginner, yes, you can alter your clothes. Look at this skirt, it's an elastic weight skirt, and all I did was turn it inside out and pinch it in towards me, and add pins so that it fitted. I wanted to make it a fitted skirt. And then I just added a stitch on each side in order to make it fit me. ♪ Take my heart, I never thought I'd give this heart ♪ ♪ Oh, I can't get enough, you got me singing like ♪ After I evaluated whether it actually fit or not, I went and cut off the excess, and you can actually add a zigzag stitch to the edges if you don't have a serger, and voila, you are done. Now you have a skirt that fits, and this is super, super simple. Here's another super simple fashion upcycle that you can do as a beginner. Take two men's dress shirts, and then just cut a strip out of one. Cut one in half, and add that strip in the middle. Once again, it is two stitches, literally two stitches, and then you've converted a men's dress shirt into a shirt dress. Now, you do have to make sure that both of your dress shirts are the same width, and so you have to lay them flat and make sure they are the same width. But other than that, it's two stitches and you're done. Now, if you wanna get fancy, at the end you can add a top stitch to make those seams lay nice and flat, and then it'll look more professional. Like I said, on the edges you can either add fray check or a zigzag stitch if you don't have a serger. As a beginner, you have an easy fashion project that looks really nice. And if you haven't subscribed, what are you waiting for? Definitely hit that subscribe button and turn on all notifications so you don't miss a thing. You do not wanna miss what is going on in here, if you are in Houston and you want to take my in-person sewing class. Hi, everyone, I'm Sonia. Hi, hi. I love that she took this older sewing machine out because my neighbor, he and his brother walked over in a cabinet, their grandparent's sewing machine. So it's a very old one. It works perfectly. I did go on YouTube and learn how to prepare it. So I do have that experience. And then one day my daughter lost the zipper and she said, can you sew me a zipper? You see where I'm sitting? So no, I don't, my mother can do this in her sleep. We didn't learn how to do that. We were playing. This is me trying to do like you, Crystal, trying to get caught up because this one with the whole jacket thing, I think I did a hemline on something and it was okay, but you see where I am. Definitely check that link out in the description box. And I know some of you guys have been asking if I'm going to do online classes, I will look into seeing how we can do that in the best way possible. You guys know, I don't want to give you guys especially paid products that are not effective because if you take my class, I want you to come out knowing how to sew. But here on the channel, if you are going to be in Chicago on July 13th, I am doing a thrift tour. That's a Saturday. I'm doing a thrift tour and I'm going to publish where we're going to be, what times we're going to be there so you can thrift with me. So definitely check that description box for more details about that. All right, back to the video. All right, here's another alteration you can do. Did you know that you can upsize your pants or your jeans as a beginner? Yes, this one is actually four stitches, but once again, we're just talking about straight stitches. What you're going to do with a pair of pants that doesn't fit, you're going to take it and you're going to cut it up the sides. Or if you have patience enough, you can use your seam ripper and seam rip the sides. You're also going to cut the waistband. In this case. And you're going to add a strip of something. It could be denim. If you're doing jeans, it could be another material. It could be whatever you want to add complementary. Now you could add something that it matches very well so that it looks like it was never done. Whatever you want to add on the side, you're going to take a strip and you're going to add that on the side. ♪ Baby, you're coming, going crazy for me when I can't seem to get over you ♪ And now, like I said, with four stitches, you have pants that fit. And lastly, let's add a little razzle-dazzle to this. I want you as a beginner to learn how to do a ruffle. And with this, it's still a straight stitch, but it's what I call a gathering stitch. With a gathering stitch, it's just a very loose stitch that you can pull the thread and make your fabric gather. And so what you want to do in order to make a gathering stitch, you want to be on a straight stitch and you want to take your tension all the way up to the highest number. And you also want to take your stitch length all the way up to the highest number that it will go. Then you're going to sew along just like you always do. And then you're going to pull the bobbin or the bottom thread that was sewn. As you pull that gently, because it will break, gently, now you have a ruffle. With this tote bag, once again, other than the gathering stitch, everything else is plain stitches. So once you've done some of those other projects, you're going to be able to make this ruffle tote. ♪ That's really, really comfy, everything you do is cool ♪ ♪ It's kind of unbelievable ♪ For my second class of my learn to sew in six weeks, we had students making this bag and they turned out so, so cute. So I know you can do it. So there you have it, five DIY upcycling fashion projects that you can do as a beginner. So definitely let me know, are you going to try these? Have you already tried some of these? Let me know in the comments and let me know some other easy things that you want to see me make tutorials for so that you can continue to enhance your sewing and upcycling skills. I will see you in the next one. Bye.