Bear Paw Mittens

 I have a sweet 3 year old nephew (who happily lives just down the road from us) who loves to be a bear and growl very fiercely. He has a bear hat and had bear paw mittens but they were getting too small. So for his recent birthday I decided to make him a new, bigger pair of mittens.

I had mentioned that this year in my desire to not overload our lives (mine or others) with more stuff I am going to give gifts that are either handmade from items I already have, are money, are gifts of experiences or are second hand and I was able to barter for them (or already had them). It is part of my goal not to promote the excess of stuff and not bringing more things into our world by buying new.

 This gift filled the requirements quite nicely. I was able to make them from some fake fur that my mom had cut out of an old coat and given to me because she thought I might use it. The lining is from a scrap piece of fleece that I had on hand - I was able to use pretty nearly all of it up with this project. I also used some pre-used elastic and then some thread that I had on hand. I used this online pattern for my starting point but then changed it up to make them look like paws and also to make them a little longer.

 It was a fun project. Have you been working on any projects lately? I did a little mending today but no big sewing projects are on my schedule just now. I am actually thinking that I should get working at trying my hand at mudding the drywall that we put up in the basement. I need to watch some Youtube videos on it first though. :-)