Garnet Hill Skirt Knock Off

I hope you all enjoyed Thomas' first post on his trip to Israel. LEAVE A COMMENT - it'll probably encourage him to do his second installment sooner.

In the meantime, I've been digging through the pics on my computer and thought I might share a simple recycle project that I first mentioned back in February. It of course took me until July to sew, and until October to share :). 

Here's the inspiration photo from Garnet Hill. I thought these were so cute! But way too pricey at $40 a skirt.

At a local Salvation Army I looked for a man's shirt- something bright with a strong pattern. Although, this wasn't quite what I was hoping for, at $1.50 (it was half price green tag day) it was a steal for an experiment.  Add $1 worth of elastic and less than that in thread, and you have a fantastic substitute for a $40 skirt.

If you sew, have kids, and like clean design, you probably already read MADE, but if you don't check it out! Dana has great taste, a wonderful photographic eye, and a ton of fun, free tutorials. For this project I used her Simple Skirt tutorial.

Do you like how I don't iron before I sew? I get more done this way :).

This really was a super fast skirt pattern. I added some pockets like the inspiration skirt. Eden LOVES pockets. They are perfect for all the rocks and flowers she collects. Seriously- does anybody else's kid think that rocks are the coolest things ever?

The only tweak that would have made it closer to the inspiration (aside from a brighter, bolder print) would be to replace the buttons with some bright colors. Maybe next summer :).


I mentioned that I finished this skirt in July- which was when Thomas was in Israel. Eden did GREAT all things considered for a two year old whose dad is overseas for a month; however, she had a few, hmmm, "behavior flare ups" and they really came across in her desire to not be cute for pictures.

I think she failed :). My little wild thing.

This is what happens when you teach them to roar before they can even talk.

Well- at least she eventually stopped growling :).