Quote Originally Posted by Owlie View Post
If you get lucky, there are some sweaters (even store-bought) where the fabric isn't knit, cut and sewn, but it's knit so that the body up to the sleeves is a single length of yarn. You can take the sweater apart, unravel it, and use the yarn for your own nefarious purposes.
Or take 100% wool sweaters, wash and dry them in the machine (exactly what you should NOT do with wool sweaters!) so they shrink and felt, then cut out mitten-shaped pieces and sew them together. There are patterns that put the thumb in a better spot by using separate thumb pieces sewn onto the main part, to avoid the awkwardness of having the thumb out to the side, but they are also more complicated.