Candice Ayala's Upcycling Challenge

A while back, a friend of mine, whose sister owns an adorable boutique, gave me this funky pair of pants. They’ve always been just a little too tight and I’ve never quite been bold enough to wear them. I love the fun print though and have been wanting to upcycle them into something for my daughter and just haven’t gotten around to it. I came across Candice Ayala’s Upcycling Challenge on Instagram and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to get to work on turning these forgotten pants into something usable!

You can read about Candice’s challenge here, but basically it’s a competition to upcycle an existing piece into something new and fresh! One of the requirements is that you also use a new piece of fabric along with the existing piece chosen to upcycle.

A romper was the first idea that came to mind because my daughter has been trying to squeeze into her favorite H&M romper ever since the weather became a bit warmer. She loves it, even though the legs are high rise and it rides up her little bum, lol! That very romper is what I used as a pattern to turn the funky pants into a fun little outfit!

To get started, I literally just laid the H&M romper at the fold of the pants and cut around it leaving extra length and a little extra width since the H&M romper was too short and a bit tight for my daughter.

After cutting around the legs, I grabbed some plain black jersey knit fabric for the bodice. I laid the existing romper at the fold of the jersey fabric and did my best to use it as a pattern leaving a bit of extra growing room.

Next, I cut 1 1/2″ strips from the pants to create my own bias tape to finish off the edges of the bodice. This fabric is extremely light weight and airy, so it was a bit difficult to work with, but I think it turned out a-okay.

I wanted to include an elastic waist band because I like the cinched waist look, and so the romper will grow with my daughter. I used the existing waist band from the pants to create a pocket for a draw string waist and then added a little pocket on the bodice for a fun little pop!