Hacked pajamas.
What do you do when your toddler’s pajamas are so small, you can no longer zip them up? “Cut scissors. Fix sewing machine.” That’s what Arlo told me to do when I explained that something needed to be done about his dinosaur pajamas. And, that’s exactly what we did.
Cut out zipper, cut off sleeves, cut open legs.
I cut out the zipper of his pajamas, cut open the legs and cut off the sleeves, leaving a sort of long vest.
Cut out a piece of an old t-shirt to fill in the cut apart pajamas.
Then, I took one of my husband’s old t-shirts and cut out a piece along the neckline to fill in the open space in the front of what was left of the pajamas.
Pin pajamas to t-shirt fabric – inside to inside – to prepare for a folded back edge.
Then, I pinned the pieces together – inside to inside – because I wanted to finish with a folded back edge.
Straight stitch – right across the dinosaurs head!
I straight stitched the pieces together.
Fold back and straight stitch – through the dino’s head again – to get a finished edge.
Then, I folded back the two pieces of fabric back over onto the t-shirt fabric and straight stitched again to finish the edge.
Use the t-shirt’s original hem to finish the bottom of pajama hack.
Next, I finished off the bottom of the pajamas creation using the t-shirt’s existing hem folded up to fit the length of the pajama legs.
Add t-shirt fabric to fill in back of pajamas.
I added another piece of fabric from the old t-shirt to fill in the back of the pajamas, again using the t-shirt’s original hem.
Cut sleeves of t-shirt and cut down to size for pajamas.
Then, it was time for the sleeves. I cut the sleeves of my husband’s old t-shirt and then cut them down to size to fit onto the pajamas – leaving a little extra for stitching the sleeve closed again.
Carefully straight stitch the sleeve onto the pajamas – inside pajamas to outside sleeve.
I flipped the pajama creation and sleeves inside out and straight stitched them on – inside of pajamas to outside of sleeves. Stitching sleeves onto a shirt can be tricky on a sewing machine. You have to be careful not to get the fabric bunched under the presser foot and stitch through more than the intended layers of fabric – I did this a few times and had to go back and seam rip to fix it.
Finished sleeve.
I flipped the hacked pajamas right side out again and stitched along the sleeve seem to finish it off. All done! And, doesn’t he look cute!
Arlo models his mom-made pajama creation!