How to Make a Cloth Pumpkin from a Sweater

Fall Fling: A series celebrating the best of the autumn season with recipes, crafts and more!

A few years ago I posted a tutorial about how to make a very easy-to-sew cloth pumpkin. I wanted to try something a little different this fall, so I made some pumpkins using old sweaters.

Like the original tutorial it’s very simple.

Gather your old sweaters. No one in my house wanted to give up their sweaters to my scissors, so I bought some at Salvation Army.

They were actually really nice sweaters. I kind of felt bad cutting them up.

Cut off the top part of the sweater just below the sleeves.

Now if you’re more ambitious than I am and you don’t mind a bit of sewing, you could cut the sleeves off and sew up the holes. That would give you a taller, less squat pumpkin. And what to do with the leftover half? I don’t know. A shrug? A really warm bandu top? Use your imagination. Or just throw it away like I did, because you know you’ll never use it if you save it.

Next sew a running stitch around the cut edge. You need to use something strong like embroidery thread, yarn or even twin. You can purchase large needles made just for yarn. Those work with the twine also.

Then pull both ends of the thread to close the opening.

Now you’re ready to stuff your pumpkin. You can use anything. I used newspaper.

The Wall Street Journal to be exact. My husband gets one in the mail every day, so I had lots of newsprint on hand. It took about one and a half Journals to make a full looking pumpkin. You could, of course, use actual stuffing, but it’s kind of expensive if you need a lot.

Then sew a running stitch around the top of the pumpkin to close it off. On this one I sewed just below where the finished edge of the sweater started. That left a bit of a ruffle on top when I closed it.

For this I used the yarn needle and twine. I tried embroidery thread first, but it broke when I pulled it to close the top.

To add more shape to your pumpkin and create the ribs, wrap twine around the pumpkin eight times, crisscrossing it on the bottom, like tying ribbon around a present.

The tighter you pull the twine the more shape your pumpkin will have.

For the stem I used a stick I found in my yard. If you don’t live somewhere that you can find a stick you could use a dowel cut to the right length. Wrap the stick with twine, and insert in the top of the pumpkin.

So here are my sweater pumpkins.

I embellished this one with a felt crow I cut out from a pattern I found online. I think this one is my favorite, and most realistic. Well, besides the crow.