Something out of Nothing

There has been a bit of a mission here lately to use up some of our unwanted stuff. There is a new Guide badge book out and my Big girl and I had mixed feelings about it. It is supposed to reflect the modern girl but we were left a bit wanting on the creative side of things.

Rightly, gone are the days where girls are only expected to cook, sew, hostess, flower arrange etc. I was quite a tom boy as a teenager and the guide leader had to specially order the farming and woodwork badges that I achieved in the 1980's. Now badges include: vlogging, your personal brand, campaigning, mixology for non-alcoholic cocktails! To name a few. We were not sure what to think about them. 

We agreed that girls shouldn't think that their role is solely to be a housewife but in our house of creative makers we all like to be engineers, problem solvers and skill builders.

After much discussion about feminism, Big Sis chose the upcycling badge in order to shoe horn in her own interests. She is a keen recycler with green credentials. She decided to turn a shirt into a summer skirt. She had watched the Sewing Bee episode 5 where reusing fabrics was the key theme. 

This was her inspiration as well as a shirt skirt that was now too small, see the tutorial link on the left hand side. This shirt was a wonderfully soft Boden linen mens shirt but it had a tear hole in a prominent place on the sleeve. 

She removed the pocket, and cut it just under the sleeves. She made her own elastic casing and decided to keep the shirt hem shape. 

To add to it she spotted a piece of cotton lace to trim the edge. She reattached the pocket. The look on her face when she thought this was a completely original idea was priceless.

Next she went through her clothes looking for things that she could change. She found a chewing gum coloured t-shirt and remembered she had been given a tie dye kit at Christmas. She dyed the top with her dad and was really pleased with the results.

We love having these skills in our family, it makes us who we are. She is hoping to get her upcycling badge next week and has started on an art apron next. Whittling was a close second so she might start that badge in the summer.

Any thoughts on the new Guide badges? Do you remember one you worked particularly hard on?

Jo xxx