How to build an "Ugly Christmas Sweater" with a LOT of pictures

This post may be my one and only "How To" something, so I hope you enjoy  :)

My employer had a Christmas party on the 13th that was announced about a month ahead of that.  A part of that announcement was an ugly sweater contest with the winner getting a $50 gift card.

I thought about what I would like to do for about 10 seconds before a fairly morbid and a bit flaunty idea came to mind.

Get a sweat from Salvation Army, find a reindeer and combine the two.

The decapitated head would be mounted on a fireplace at chest level and the cut off tail on my butt so I could walk around and say, "Check out my rack and tail".

Hubby totally rolled his eyes at the idea.  The kids laughed and laughed about it and told me that I couldn't do such a thing because I was a mom.  Our exchange student, Ayleen, LOVED the idea.  My dad said I had a warped sense of humor.

I followed Ayleen's enthusiasm and went for it.

So it was off to the Salvation Army we went to look for a perfect sweater and to see if they had any reindeer.

Wouldn't you know, it was my lucky day... they had both.  The sweater was $3.50, the reindeer holding a baby was $1.50.  Then off to Walmart we went to get some yarn and beads to put it all together.

This is what I started with minus the bead necklaces.

Step 1: The fun step

Decapitate the reindeer.

No!!! I didn't do anything wrong!  Why me???

I cut just below the neck line so I had enough fur to sew off his head with.

I think I have lost my head and I don't know where I put it!

HELP!  My head has fallen off and I'm losing my brains!!!!!

Here you can see the extra fur fabric.

Something just doesn't feel right.

 I took some brown thread and needle and simply cross sewed the sides down to close up the whole.

I feel as if my head is back together, but something is STILL missing.

Here is the bottom of the head all sewed up together... not too shabby for an amateur.  

I feel as if I am whole, yet am not.  Hmmm....

The rest of the reindeer was set aside to use later.

Step 2:  Trial and Error

Making of the fireplace

How do I want to put it all together???

To start, I simply tied a knot in the super thick yarn, and used a crochet hook to pull it through the sweater's inside.

 I should have taken a picture of the finished products inside... I'm sure it was awful.

This is the front and my first trial and error.  I was going to short 3 inch lines for the outline of the fireplace.

After about three minutes of doing things in short lines, I decided that would take way too long.

So I went to one long line instead.

It was MUCH quicker that way.  I had an outline for a fireplace in about 4 minutes.

Step 3: Make a fire pit for the fire place

Time to braid.

After the braid was long enough, I pulled one end through with the crochet hook and tied it off on the inside.  Then I took short, about 3-4 inch pieces of yarn, threaded it through the braid and pulled the two ends through the inside of the sweater and tied them together to tack the braid in place in about 6 different places.

Voila, a fireplace.

 Step 4:  Mantle

Every good fireplace has a pretty mantle

Made with finger knitting??

I wanted to add some color to my mantle, so I tied both the green and brown yarns together and around my thumb then went over/ under my fingers.

And over under coming back and out twice so I could weave or knit (not sure on what this is called exactly?)

.

Take the bottom loop and put your finger through it to make it go on the back side of your hand.

 Once all fingers are done, take the yarn and wind them down and back so you can start the process over.  Do this over and over again until you get your desired length.

Next, take a short piece of green yarn, tie it to the mantle.  I think this was done in five or six places as I didn't want the mantle to be saggy like my rack.

Pull the ends through to the back and tie together.

Step 5:  Make a Christmas Tree

By crocheting

Without any real know how

I did single down and back stitches (?) making a tree.  I actually made a small tree first, then ended up adding more to the bottom as it was not big enough for the shirt.

I truly went back and forth and guessed with the pointy ends.  I had to keep telling myself that this was for an ugly sweater, not a pretty one, so imperfections were ok.

I took some brown yarn to the bottom to make the tree trunk.

Step 6:  Decorating 

More yarn

I cut up a bunch of small pieces of yarn about the length of my palm.

In a whimsical, ugly sweater fashion, I placed the small lengths of yarn on my tree by pulling the center of the yarn folded in half from back to front so that the ends would go through the middle.  I wish I would have taken a picture of the end product... it was pretty gaudy.

Then I took cut my beaded necklaces so they were a single strand (buy the cheap ones in the party aisle of the store, it is cheaper than regular strands of beads and you won't lose beads since it is all plastic.)  

In a "who cares what it looks like" attitude, tie the strands to the yarn to hold them on.  Then pull the yarn ends back through to the back of the tree and tie the ends together one more time to make sure the beads stay on. 

You can add as much or as little strings as you want.. I went over board a bit because it was fun.  Here is the tree before I pulled the ends through to the back and before two more strands went on it.

The tree was crochet attached to the sweater so that it wouldn't fall off due to it's heavy weight.

Step 7: Sew the head on

Tie the end of the string to the sweater and attach the head to the sweater.  I sewed it on really well to make sure it wouldn't fall off.

I then cut out the baby reindeer and sewed that onto the sweater as well as the "Merry Christmas" and placed that into the fireplace for my fire.

Here is the finished product.

But what to do with the body of the reindeer?

I tried to convince hubby to let me safety pin it to his shirt at his belly so that he could say he ate it.

But he wasn't up for that.... party pooper he is.

So then I was going to have him just carry it around the party and say that he shot it because it looked pretty dead after I got done sewing red ribbon where the head went and added some red yarn to the hole that was left from cutting the "Merry Christmas" bad off of the reindeer's belly to make it look like an exit wound.

Then, hubby surprised me and said he would carry it around if he could put a bolt from my crossbow in it and wear his camo shirt to the party.  He really is a keeper with his ideas :)

We ended up losing the contest to a guy who wore ugly sweaters all week to work and pranced around the party in one that was four sizes too small, but....

We did have a lot of fun and made a lot of people laugh which is way better than a $50 gift card any day.

I feel like my body is oh so close. At least I'm with my baby.