t-shirt turned scarf tutorial

First off, you should know...I don't follow directions. I can, but I don't. I read them and if I don't have everything I need, I don't let that stop me and I just wing it. I do this about 50% of the time and I've been lucky so far.

Case in point:

I used a tutorial that I thought I had posted from my Pinterest or from my Tumblr, but it's not there. If anyone knows who I need to credit with this idea, please let me know. The tut advised using an XL t-shirt, but I really, really wanted to use this T: I love the color and the texture and I hated that it had a stain on it. I tell you this just in case you're wondering why the scarf is a little short!

Let's begin with your favorite t-shirt {stained or unstained} and cut as many strips as you can  at approximately 2" wide.

Taking your strips into your hands and begin stretching them as wide and as far as you can get them to go. My photo shows me using my foot {you caught me in my favorite UGG house shoes, also stained, and my comfy jammie bottoms} and my hand because I was too lazy to get the tripod from our bedroom closet upstairs.

Stretching causes the T to curl and therefore won't fray. Pretty cool!

Here you see one of the 2" wide strips before stretching and the rest that have already been stretched. Love those Fiskars scissors!

See those really ugly ends where the seems meet? Hated that, so I cut them off. Love it! I hated throwing away the rest of the t-shirt, so I punched a 2" circle and 1.25" circle and traced them onto the remaining fabric. I had an idea AND I wanted something to cover up the middle seam that showed when I looped my scarf around my neck.

After cutting my circles, I stretched them which caused the to ruffle a little bit and I loved that, too! I stacked several of the 2" circles on top of one another and then 2 or 3 of the 1.25" circles on top of them. Next, I used my Crop-o-Dile to punch a hole through all layers at once...wow, I'm impressed, it worked like a dream, baby.

And then I used a brad {edited to add: I changed these smaller brads out for larger ones because they ended up getting pulled through the hole I punched. I could also have sewn them on, but  this seemed easier and I would probably do it this way again} to add a little pizazz and pushed it right through one of the t-shirt strips where the seams met.

I'm definitely on the market for some clearance t-shirts in fun colors...wouldn't they be fun in a number of different colors? My Mom loves scarves as much, or more, than I do and Isabella is becoming a fan, too. Which means that Victoria will want one of her own. Maybe I should make this my first Christmas Craft of the year!

Don't you love it when you upcycle something that would have had to be recycled and now it's a fun pieced of neck art? I do, too!